Serendipity
by Pandora147
Summary: You stumble across love when you least expect it. True love is unplanned, but never unwelcome. TxG. Rated M. A fanfiction comprising of smaller chapters updated throughout the holiday season.
1. PROLOGUE

_**SERENDIPITY**_

**Disclaimer: **Characters are utilised courtesy of the _Disney_ franchise; original plot line belongs to me. I make no money from my dabbling in this universe.

**Author's Note: **Just a little something I've been throwing together an outline for in between working on TST: Part III. Thanks to **www . 750Words . com **for helping me to focus my muse. I'll be updating with shorter, simpler chapters over the next month. Rated anywhere from PG - R depending on the chapter and my mood.

**PROLOGUE**

_~ December 24th, 2012 ~_

The heater had been blasting for hours, ensuring that despite the chilly December weather, the apartment would remain warm:and that was a certainty, between the literal temperature and a whole other kind of heat which was brewing. He'd given into her pleading appeal and they had playing a mix CD of Christmas songs she'd collected, songs by popular artists like _Celine Dion_ and _Mariah Carey_, all of which celebrated love and Christmas. For that was exactly was what Christmas was about, especially for the two of them: Christmas was about love.

Her back arched, a moan escaping from her lips as his warm lips trailed a languorous lick down her neck and landed on the exposed flesh of her breast. They'd had invitations to attend parties; the neighbours were having a celebration, some of her colleagues and his former colleagues were throwing a party in Palo Alto. But they had no interest in anyone else. They only had interest in each other.

"I love you," she mumbled by his ear, the sentence being punctuated with a throaty gasp as his fingers found their way into her panties, having wiggled underneath her jeans. She quickly assisted him, undoing her button and fly to give him a little more room to manoeuvre.

"Do you really?" he murmured, suckling on the flesh just behind her ear, the fragrance of her shampoo still present as his nose was surrounded by her dark, wavy tresses of hair. "You love the way I make you feel... when I do this..."

His index and middle fingers plunged into her wet entrance, her warm flesh a familiar but always exciting sensation to his touch. She groaned, fingers palming over the warm skin of his back.

"Yes..." she responded, and captured his lips in her own.

They so rarely had time for just the two of them - how they'd managed to have time to forge a relationship was a little bit of a mystery. The chemistry, the connection, had been strong from the first day they'd met each other. Somewhere deep down, they'd both known that you don't come across that magic every day. They made time. Gave up sleep. She drove back and forth the San Mateo bridge to visit him at his second job, just to sit beside him and bask in his presence, even if they were surrounded by ringing phones and a flurry of activity.

"You and me... just you and me baby... for a whole week..." he gasped between wet, desperate kisses. His spare hand tugged at her jeans, pulling them down until they pooled around her knees.

"You promise? The whole week... no one else... just us?"

His thumb circled around her clit and she let out a gasp.

"Promise... even if we're just eating baked beans and canned tuna at the end of the week."

They'd stocked up on groceries, anticipating that they wouldn't be emerging from his apartment for anything that wasn't completely necessary. The only thing that was necessary was being together. Twelve months was a long time to be desperately in love with someone and to be living a half hour away from them and yet have to battle with life obligations to see each other. The longest they'd had together was from Friday evening until Sunday morning – a precious window of time which they basked in almost every weekend for exactly 52 weeks.

"The last year, all I've wanted to do is spent every waking moment with you," she panted, grasping her hands at his jeans, needing to feel more of his skin against hers. "I don't like sharing you with other people... I just want it to be us, and no one else..."

"I know baby, I know..."

Her hands were frantically roaming over his body, grasping at every inch of his exposed skin, pulling his boxer briefs away, her hand enclosing around his erect cock and sighing at the sensation of him within her hands. She felt suddenly overwhelmed, feeling the desire to devour him and to be surrounded by him immediately. He took his free hand and pressed it over her heart, and pressed a soft kiss to hers, slowing down the pace.

"Slow down, baby. We have all the time in the world," he murmured.

"I know. I just... I need you so badly."

Sometimes someone comes into your life through unusual circumstances, sometimes life insists that they be thrust into your path. Serendipity, fate, destiny, whatever it may be - neither had realised they believed in it, but neither could deny that their lives had been charmed by it. It had been Christmas Eve, exactly one year ago, when their lives had simultaneously changed forever.


	2. ONE

_**SERENDIPITY**_

ONE

_~ November 16th, 2011 ~_

It was a clock watching day at the offices of _Inspire Solutions_. Gabriella Montez was becoming impatient. Some days just dragged - it was like the hands of time actually slowed almost to a halt in some unnatural way.

"I'll put together our handover e-mail," Kelsi volunteered.

Gabriella looked up at her team member, sitting in the desk across from her. "Thanks Kels, I've gotta get this report done before 5pm."

"Not a problem, I'm just mucking around on Facebook anyway," Kelsi said with a laugh.

"Makes a nice change of pace to the days when we're staying back for hours doing 'volunteer hours'," Gabriella said wryly, before turning back to stare at her computer screen which was a little fuzzy in front of her.

She'd been working on the report for an hour on and off in between taking various phone calls and dealing with a couple of payroll issues. She decided she was best to knuckle down and just get it done, as it would help the remainder half hour of the day go a little quicker. Surely enough, Gabriella glanced up and it was 4:55pm, she'd finished her report and Kelsi was waiting on the countdown for when they could divert their phones to their support team for after business hours. The minute the clock struck 5:00pm, Kelsi skipped toward the front of the office where the magic button to hit the button to divert the phones was located on the receptionists phone at the front.

With a whistle Kelsi returned, and asked Gabriella, "Do you want me to call them?"

Gabriella shook her head, with a small smile on her face. "I'll call, you get out of here."

"You sure?"

"Not a problem."

"Thanks Gabriella!" Kelsi had already packed up her belongings and put the out of office onto her e-mail, and it took a mere thirty seconds to log off her computer. "Have a good night! Don't stay too late!"

Gabriella dialled the familiar number - it was a phone call she made almost every day, ingrained as a part of her routine.

_"Welcome to Inspire Solutions, this is Taylor speaking, how can I help you?"_ the voice chirped at the end.

"Hi, Taylor, it's Gabriella, from the Palo Alto office." The noting which office she was from was a little redundant, they knew each others voices since Gabriella made a phone call to their support office almost daily.

_"Hey Gabriella. You're handing over on time today!"_

Gabriella laughed. "Yes, been a good day for once."

_"Troy's on another call... do you... oh wait, he's getting off the phone._ I'll put you through now, okay?"

"Sure, thanks."

_"Have a great night!"_

She listened to the hold music for a few moments. _"Troy speaking, how can I help you?"_

Her colleagues were always excited about handing over, about that magical time of day when you could pack up and go home and let the night shift deal with the problems. Gabriella loved handover too - but it wasn't really about going home. It was about those magical two minutes that she spent talking to _him_.

"Troy, it's Gabriella." Somehow when she spoke to him, she knew that her tone of voice changed. She would sit up straighter, try to sound sweeter, friendlier, more alluring.

_"Heyyy Gabriella!" _his friendly tone exclaimed. _"I've only just walked in, I'm logging in right now."_

"Sorry, were we too efficient for you today?" she teased.

He laughed. _"That, and I was running late. Just bear with me, I need to get your handover e-mail open. You got any plans for tonight?"_

"You know me Troy, such a rager, going home to my empty apartment and my frozen dinner," she said with a roll of the eyes and a laugh.

_"Maybe half a glass of wine with dinner, celebrate getting out of there on time,"_ he suggested.

"Maybe."

_"Okay, I've got it all open. It's looking like a awesome handover – you're letting me have an easy night are you?"_

"I can always find work for you to do if you are bored."

He laughed. His laugh was magic – it placed an instantaneous smile on her face. _"Nah, you know the LA office kills me. You guys are easy compared to what they leave me with. They forget I'm just a guy working a second job to make some cash, not an expert in this stuff like you guys."_

She was about to question his statement – this was new information, that working for Inspire's call centre was a second job for him - when he said, "Can you hang on a tick, Gabriella?"

She'd do anything for him. Of course she'd wait. She heard a muffled conversation, like he'd placed his hand over the mouthpiece of the phone.

_"Sorry, Taylor has LA on the phone to hand over."_

She felt disappointed – she liked when they had time to have a quick chat. "That's okay, you go. Everything is good with mine, nothing outstanding, and I'm on buddy so if you need anything, give me a call."

_"Thanks, you enjoy your night. Talk to you tomorrow!"_

The call was discontinued, and she immediately let out a sigh – it was partially a sigh of content from having been conversing with him, and partially a sigh of regret that the phone call was over. Monday - Thursday, she would talk to him. Sometimes, on a Sunday, if there was a problem going on over the weekend, she'd get to hear his friendly voice. On Friday's, it just wasn't the same when she'd handover with Taylor. But Monday - Thursday, it was their time. She didn't know the man. She didn't know where he lived, what colour his hair was, whether he liked chocolate or pizza, if he liked dogs or cats, what he did during the day to make him the kind of person who would want to do an evening call centre job. But she knew that he was funny, she knew that he was friendly, she knew that he was kind. When her colleagues were off sick and there was too much outstanding for her to handover but she was stuck alone in the office, he'd e-mail her and ask if she needed a hand with anything. He'd send her text messages from the work system letting her know about the progress with things with her clients that she had wanted updates on. For those few minutes each evening, she would sit at her desk, smiling like a fool.

She didn't quite understand what it was about him, how it was that a man who was just a voice on the phone could bring a smile to her face – but whatever it was, somehow, he helped her to get through the day, and in a high pressure stressful job like that which she'd found herself in, anything that helped her to get through the day without going insane was worthwhile clinging onto: no matter how bizarre it may be.


	3. TWO

_**SERENDIPITY**_

TWO

_~ Wednesday 23rd November, 2011 ~_

"Today was just the most ridiculous day ever," Gabriella groaned.

She rubbed her eyes as she stared bleakly at her computer screen. She was on hold with the support team, only just ready to hand over at 6:30pm. Their team had been inundated with phone calls, client requests, new business queries, and they'd only just finally been able to divert the phones. They were understaffed – their manager was away on a training conference, and one of their colleagues, Martha, had been on extended sick leave, and wasn't due to come back for another week or so.

"I just want to go home and not come back here again, ever," Kelsi said, also with a bitter groan.

The good days around their office at _Inspire_ were great – they had an awesome team, a fantastic manager, they would laugh and joke and muck around. But it was such a high pressure job, when the day was hectic it was truly hectic.

"I've been on hold waiting for ages, I just want to leave! I swear, Troy just needs to give me his direct line," Gabriella said with a pout.

"They sit at hot desks, don't they?"

"I think so, but I got the impression from talking to Troy that he's always at the same desk. He was talking about the view out the window."

Gabriella giggled, recalling something funny about that particular conversation. She missed the small smile on Kelsi's face as she heard the phone clicking from the hold music to finally being picked up.

"_Troy speaking, how can I help you?"_

"Hi, it's Gabriella," she greeted him. "Finally! You were on that call for ages. I was about to e-mail you and tell you to hurry up and take my call."

He laughed and groaned. _"I got stuck! I wish you had, I could've said I had an urgent call waiting to get off. One of the contractors was calling with a pay query, I'm like, dude, I'm not a payroll bitch, I don't have any idea how much you're meant to be taxed. Call during _business hours_ and we can put you to the payroll department!"_

Gabriella tutted sympathetically. "Payroll queries are a bitch. I always palm them off onto other people."

"_Anyway, why are you there so late? I was seriously thinking you'd just forgotten to handover and left, I was gonna call your work cell soon."_

"It's been a really, really awful day," Gabriella explained wearily. "I'm really sorry but we've had to hand a bit over, it's all simple but there's a bit of it there."

"_It's fine, don't apologise. That's why we're here. Don't be afraid to hand me stuff to do."_

Gabriella proceeded to go through the handover with him, and then realised she'd omitted something very important. "Oh! I forgot one thing. Can I flick you a quick e-mail about it and you add it on?"

"_For you, of course."_

_~ Tuesday 29__th__ November, 2011 ~_

Gabriella lived a fairly simple existence. She finished work, went home, chilled, went to bed, woke up, came back to work – repeat. There was a lot of pressure from management to tidy up the loose ends prior to the new year starting, so Gabriella had spent a lot of time assisting her colleagues with administrative tasks they were behind on, doing a fair volume of overtime. One day bled into another.

It was Tuesday when Gabriella next sat on the phone waiting to do their after hours handover, waiting only

briefly before Troy answered the call.

"_Troy speaking."_

"Hi Troy," she said with a smile, not even noting who it was.

"_Hey!" _he greeted her enthusiastically. "_Where have you been?"_

She could almost hear him frown over the phone. His question confused her, she cocked her head and asked, "How do you mean?"

_"Well... yesterday I talked to Kelsi, and Thursday as well..."_

She smiled – he was referring to the fact that they hadn't spoken since last Wednesday. It had become almost ingrained within her routine to speak to him pretty much daily, and it had been a weird feeling to have not spoken to him in so long.

"Did you miss me?" she asked teasingly.

He laughed his musical laugh, and responded equally teasingly, "_It just isn't a good night without hearing your voice."_

Gabriella smirked, and continued with the teasing. "What about Friday, huh Troy? Were were you on Friday? How dare you have a day off!"

He laughed. _"You know I don't work Friday's. Well not here, anyway."_

Suddenly Gabriella felt a little worried that he didn't know that she knew - she did know, she knew very well that Troy had Friday and Saturday off. "Yes, I know that, you work Sunday evening instead."

They went silent for a moment and Troy cleared his throat. _"Anyway so uh... I've already read your handover, it's a beautiful one."_

"Thought I'd go easy on you tonight," she teased.

"_Appreciated. LA is already causing me grief."_

"Well I'd better let you go and deal with it all."

"_Do you have to? I'd rather just talk to you."_ His tone wasn't so much teasing as it was sincere. _"Although the boss mightn't approve, so I guess I'd better go."_

"Talk to you soon," Gabriella said, before they finished the call and she hung up.

"What was that conversation about?" Kelsi asked, from where she was at her desk finishing up a couple of e-mails.

Gabriella began to pack up her things into her purse. "Oh, Troy was teasing me for not having handed over yesterday or Thursday. I joked with him that he just missed talking to me."

"Gabriella... can I ask you a question?" Kelsi asked.

"Um, yeah, sure?"

"It's been six months since I've been working with you here. In that time, have you like, been on a date?"

Gabriella blinked. "Um... who has time to date in our line of work?"

"Maybe you'd find if you got out and had more fun, it'd be a release. Make the stressful days less stressful, you know?"

"Where has this come from?" Gabriella asked, furrowing her eyebrows.

"Well... you and Troy seem to get along well..." Kelsi pointed out.

Gabriella laughed loudly at the insinuation. Sure, Troy's voice was magical and she smiled like a goofy idiot. But it wasn't anything _real._ It was more of a fun random thing to get through the day.

"Kelsi, get real. I don't know anything about the guy!"

"Well, that would be the purpose of dating. You get to know each other!"

"I don't even know where he lives!"

"You know the call centre is in Oakland, so it's not like he lives across the country. He likely lives across the bay somewhere, or maybe in San Fran proper."

"I... you're crazy!"

"You light up when you talk to him! Seriously, you do!" Kelsi insisted. "Maybe you should try to get to know him better. Find out how old he is, what sorts of things he does in his free time..."

"Utterly crazy," Gabriella repeated in the same tone.

"I'm worried about you. All you do is work and go home. You need to have... something else, you know? It can't _just_ be about this place."

"And dating Troy is the answer?"

"It doesn't have to be Troy. But if you try to tell me that talking to him doesn't make you happy... then you'll be lying to my face."

Gabriella opened her mouth, and then closed it again.

Kelsi was right.


	4. THREE

_**SERENDIPITY**_

THREE

_~ Wednesday 30th November, 2011 ~_

"Hi Taylor, it's Gabriella," Gabriella greeted the after hours shift supervisor, who had picked up the phone.

_"Oh, hey Gabriella! Troy isn't here today, so I'll be doing your handover."_

"Troy isn't there?" she enquired, hoping she sounded aloof. When actually, she felt disappointed, and even a twinge of being worried. Gabriella wasn't aware that Troy's absence on a day that he was usually there would affect her.

_"Yeah, he called in sick. Damn him! Now I'm understaffed."_

"Well, I haven't handed much over so ours should all be fine. Is he okay?"

_"He's fine, I think he has food poisoning. I'm just scanning over it, it all looks good. Sorry I can't flirt with you the way Troy does."_

Her worry for his well-being was swept aside temporarily in favour of a while new set of worry. Gabriella's eyes widened, her cheeks immediately flushing. "Flirt! What are you talking about?"

_"Oh come on! He doesn't chat and laugh with anyone like he does with you girls at Palo Alto."_

She immediately felt somewhat calmer - apparently it wasn't just her. Although, it was her handing over 95 percent of the time, so most of his laughter was with her.

"I guess maybe some of the other offices just want to get out, no time for chatting. I like talking to you guys... means when I hand more over, I can suck up and get away with it," Gabriella teased.

Taylor laughed. _"That's kind of true. Troy's always swamped with LA and he just complains non-stop but doesn't seem to mind when you guys have a shocking one. Then again, that's a part of the whole flirty thing."_

Gabriella felt herself flushing again. "You need to stop with the flirting talk!"

"_It's all good fun. Anyway, I've read over your handover – just that follow up for the morning, yeah?"_

"Yes please."

"_Not a problem. You have a great night."_

Gabriella finished up her phone conversation, and turned to where Kelsi and one of their colleagues, Jacinta, were chatting as they packed up for the day.

"Hey, listen to this," Gabriella said. "Taylor from the support team just was talking about Troy flirting with us when we hand over. Imagine that!"

Jacinta giggled. "I wouldn't mind if Troy was flirting with me... he's a hottie!"

"You've met him?" Gabriella asked, feeling a slight thumping in her chest. She felt a strange wave of jealousy of her colleague.

"Yeah, he was at this training day I did. I mean, I'm a taken woman but... if I wasn't... I'd tap that."

Kelsi laughed. "He sounds young, like a cool guy."

"He's probably... 25?" Jacinta mused. "Thereabouts. _Amazing_ blue eyes, has like, an amazing run your fingers through his hair do. I talked to him briefly, not for long, but he seemed genuinely nice and surprisingly intelligent."

"He is intelligent, he handles our clients amazingly," Gabriella said, somewhat defensively.

"Better than the idiots that come in for the midnight til seven shift, that's for sure," Kelsi grumbled.

"Anyway, girls, I have to run, have to pick up my fiancee. I'll see you tomorrow!" Jacinta said, picking up her bag.

"See you Jac," Kelsi farewelled their colleague.

Gabriella was stewing over Taylor's comment, and chewed at her lower lip.

"Are you obsessing over what she said?" Kelsi asked.

"Do... do you think it could be true? I... I mean... Taylor said, the girls at Palo Alto. Not me specifically..."

"But you hand over for us most of the time," Kelsi pointed out with a smile. "Would it be a bad thing if he was flirting?"

"I... I just... do _I_ flirt with _him_?" Gabriella had never been one to be forward with flirtation, and in particular, when it came to her career she wasn't the type to want to be seen as using her feminine charms to get ahead. It worried her that if Taylor was making these types of observations when all she and Troy did was chat innocently, then who knows what other people might be saying.

Kelsi sighed. "It's subtle. You're certainly... just brighter with him than anyone else. I don't know if I'd label it as flirting per se. He just seems to bring out a bubbly side of you, which isn't a bad thing."

Gabriella moaned, head falling into her hands, slumped down at her desk. "Kelsi... I can't stop thinking about him. I know _nothing_ about him but... I don't know... there's just something there. Maybe I'm just into the _idea_ of it. It seems novel and exciting and it's nice to feel that... you know that feeling inside when you first like someone and it feels like butterflies fluttering around your heart? It's a lovely feeling, and I like feeling that way. It's been such a long time since I've felt that way about anyone."

"I already told you my advice. Go with it. What's the harm in chatting to him a bit further, subtly asking a few questions?"

"I... I guess not. There's no harm in that at all," Gabriella mused. She sighed. "I'm not good at that though... talking to guys!"

"Look at it this way – if he _is_ flirting, then obviously you're doing something right. Just be yourself, but add a few personal questions."

"I hope he's okay, Taylor said he's sick," Gabriella said, suddenly recalling why it had been Taylor she had spoken to.

"I'm sure he'll be fine. Come on, let's get out of here."

Gabrielle allowed Kelsi to drag her out of the office, but she just couldn't get Troy off her mind.


	5. FOUR

_**SERENDIPITY**_

FOUR

_~ Thursday 1st December, 2011 ~_

Overnight, the Palo Alto office of _Inspire Solutions_ had been transformed. Gabriella walked in on Thursday morning to find tinsel adorning the walls and hanging from the ceilings, Christmas ornaments scattered throughout the office and a gaudy Christmas tree in the centre of the reception area, on proud display. There was holiday music playing, one of the ladies had brought Christmas cookies and another one was wearing Christmas earrings. Without a doubt, the holiday season had arrived.

Chatter in the office was surrounding who was planning on taking leave, people's plans for the holidays, and of course, conversation surrounding the upcoming _Inspire Solutions_ Christmas Party for the San Francisco Bay Area. Gabriella wasn't particularly excited for the holidays that year – her mother was going to be heading overseas and with no other close family nearby, she'd volunteered to be a part of the skeleton staff manning the office over the holidays. The only day that the Palo Alto office was closed was going to be Christmas Eve – the other holidays all fell over the weekend – however their business requirements were going to be minimal.

She shied away from the majority of the talk, not wanting to bring down the festive mood, and so instead just put her head down and focused on her work. She had an incredibly productive day, even among the rowdiness of the office, and was surprised when she looked up and it was already 4:30pm. They'd had a good run, on top of their client base and requirements and were actually getting out of the office on time which was nice – there had been a period over summer where even with the longer summertime daylight hours, she found herself holed away in the office for the majority of the hours that the sun was up, staying back after hand over to deal with paperwork and reports.

Kelsi had been out of office last thing that afternoon to attend a meeting, leaving Gabriella to handle the handover requirements, making the phone call at about 5:15pm. She punched in the familiar number of the support team office in Oakland, dialled "2" to be diverted to the priority line, and a moment later her call was answered.

"_Thank you for calling Inspire Solutions, Troy speaking, how may I help you?"_

She smiled at his formality when he answered a call, almost wanting to cut him off as soon as she'd recognised his voice.

"Hi, it's Gabriella," she greeted him. "You're back!"

_"That I am."_

"Are you okay? Taylor said you had food poisoning."

_"I am okay, it was pretty horrid yesterday though. I felt so bad pulling out on Taylor. I didn't go to my day job either, I think I must've eaten something bad the day before, I kind of felt off at work, and had only been asleep an hour or so when I woke up feeling disgusting, and then I was up for about twelve hours puking every twenty minutes."_

Gabriella made sympathetic noises, awwing. "You're fine now though?" she asked again, just to make sure.

_"Healthy as a horse,"_ he assured her. _"I hope Taylor looked after you."_

She laughed. "Never as good as you, but don't tell her that."

"_Well it's hard to match my superior performance,"_ he boasted jokingly.

"Well there's almost nothing in my handover so you should be able to handle it tonight, as long as LA don't give you a rough time."

"_Taylor's actually reassigned LA tonight. She feels bad – I didn't go to my day job today, I think she thinks that I'm forcing myself to be here. Really, I just never use my sick leave and I thought I may as well, but here I'm technically casual although I'm here like, all the time."_

"What is your day job, anyway?" Gabriella asked.

"_I'm a teacher."_

She was surprised – she'd had a few different thoughts, mainly thinking that he probably was the kind of guy who juggled different office jobs or maybe did hospitality or retail work or perhaps even IT or ran his own business. Never would she have picked education as his true life's work.

"Wow. Seriously?"

He laughed. _"Seriously. I teach at a middle school – health science, physical education and social science."_

"Wow. What the hell are you doing working in our support team, then?"

"_Just wanna slug it out for a year or so, pay off some debt, maybe save some cash. I'm pretty lucky in that I went to college on a scholarship but I still have some student debt and also a car loan. I don't like the idea of gradually paying off debt for like, the next ten years, and then by the time that I am wanting to buy a house there's another thirty years of paying off debt."_

"Wow."

"_You said wow already," _he observed teasingly.

"Sorry," she apologised, blushing. "I just... that came as a surprise. You'd mentioned your other job but I'd never expected you to be a teacher, I'm not sure why."

He laughed. _"It's okay, it surprises a few people."_

"So you... you work full time, actually full time, plus with _Inspire?_ Seriously?"

"_Seriously," _he confirmed.

"You make me feel guilty for going home to watch TV."

"_No, you deserve it, I know you do long hours. Put your feet up, relax, enjoy!"_

"I'll do my best," she told him. "Anyway... I guess I'd better let you go."

"_I'll talk to you soon."_

"Yes um, talk to you tomorrow... probably, I guess. Hopefully. Bye!"

Gabriella stared at the telephone as she placed her handset back down. "Hopefully?" she said out loud, feeling disappointed in her lack of ability to be suave or cool at all. She then heard a laugh from behind her – and her eyes widened, whipping her head around. One of the sales reps who floated from office to office, Jason Cross, was standing behind her. Little did she know that he'd been on his way out of the office and had overheard the majority of her conversation. She flushed, she'd thought that everyone in their immediate department had already left and it was just her there. He was smirking, shaking his head at her.

"Smooth," Jason said with a chuckle.

"What?" she asked defensively.

"What was up with the giggling?" he teased her.

Gabriella was mortified – Kelsi teasing her was one thing, but Jason teasing was a whole different level of bad.

"I... I wasn't giggling," she stammered.

"Yeah right," Jason scoffed.

"We just chat. What's wrong with that, we are colleagues, after all. Everyone around here bitches about our after hours and honestly, the early morning crew suck. But Troy does really great work for us and for our clients and so what if I talk to him and think something he says is funny!"

"I didn't say anything!" Jason said, palms up, smirk on his face. "You haven't met Troy, have you?"

"No, I haven't met anyone from the support team."

"You should Facebook him..."

Gabriella rolled her eyes, attempting to sound aloof. "Why would I want to do that?"

"Just an idea. He is single, you know."

"Single and works two jobs," Gabriella scoffed – although she filed away the information of him being single into her mental file of facts about Troy.

Jason laughed. "This is true, two workaholics, never a good mix. Unless, maybe you'd be a good influence on each other. He could just work part time for us, make a bit of extra cash, but no, he does five nights. Ridiculous. the guy is gonna implode."

"Sometimes he does sound ragged," Gabriella admitted. "One night I was checking my e-mails before bed and something really important had come directly to my e-mail, so I called them and he just sounded absolutely wrecked it was probably 10pm. That was before I knew he worked two jobs."

"Guess you gotta do what you gotta do to make sure you can pay the bills or whatever."

"I guess," she said with a frown. "Anyway... this workaholic is going to actually go home instead of staying back."

"Party plans?"

"Hardly," Gabriella scoffed. "I'm just exhausted. Ready to curl up and mindlessly stare at the television."

"Yeah I'm heading off too."

"You working from here tomorrow?"

"No, I'll be at the Oakland office... I'll tell Troy you said hi," he added with a smirk.

"He doesn't work Fridays," Gabriella said immediately, feeling suddenly grateful for that fact. Jason wasn't the kind of person she could rely on to keep his nose out of her business.

"Good thing I'll be back there next week then," he joked, and laughed at the mortified expression on her face. "Gabriella, chill. Your secret is safe with me."

"I don't know what secret you're referring to," she said defiantly.

"Mm-hmm. Sure," he winked and continued on his way out of the office. "Go home, don't stay too late!" he called behind him. "Unless you're gonna call back lover boy, then feel free, take all the time you need!"

Gabriella laughed nervously. "Good night, Jason."

The moment she heard the door click closed behind him, she groaned and buried her head in her hands. It was becoming complicated before it had even began – it could only be a bad omen.


	6. FIVE

_**SERENDIPITY**_

_**AN: **Rated M: not for the blushing type._

FIVE

_~ Sunday 3rd December 2011 ~_

She'd been feeling on edge all day. It was likely hormonal - her period was due to start in a few days, and Gabriella was accustomed to the feeling of being sensitive and craving a man's touch in the few days prior. That day had been particularly difficult. She'd woken up having experienced a brief but intense dream with an unknown man - it wasn't so much a dream about a particular man, but there were flashes of _feeling_ a hard, warm body pressed up against hers, feeling someone penetrate her and feeling her wet, warm flesh heat up. She'd awoken feeling aroused and unsatisfied - and running late. She'd made plans to catch up with Kelsi and Martha who was due to come back to work the next week, having recovered from glandular fever. The girls were just grabbing brunch. Because of her morning plans, there wasn't even time to quickly relieve herself. The cafe they'd picked felt like love central – lovers out having brunch together, the waitress being brought flowers by her boyfriend in the middle of their meal.

After leaving the girls, Gabriella decided to stop by the salon to get an impromptu eyebrow wax. They'd told her that an appointment would be available in about fifteen minutes. She could've gone for a wander in the mall but instead she decided to just sit and flip through a magazine. Of course she'd picked up Cosmo and found herself immersed in a hot and heavy article about sex positions to maximise the female orgasm.

Early on Sunday evening, Troy's suggestion from the week before to have a glass of wine with dinner suddenly seemed like a splendid idea. She found herself having a couple of glasses of wine, and then after dinner enjoying a long, luxuriously hot shower. She stood in front of her dresser in her towel with her dripping hair, contemplating which night shirt to throw on, and found herself reaching for the skimpy black nightgown which fell to just above mid thigh and was low cut with a lacy top. Just slipping the material over her head and feeling the slinky fabric encase her body was enough to make her feel sexy. She was in the middle of reading _Water for Elephants _by Sara Gruen; but instead, she found herself grabbing the dirtiest Mills and Boons novel she possessed. She fell into bed around 8pm, about two hours before she'd usually retire.

She also found herself reaching into her bottom bedside drawer, which contained various items of junk and, hidden at the back, a glistening pink rubber rabbit. And not the kid friendly pet kind of rabbit.

She set the book down, finding herself being distracted by the images they were illustrating. She was content to form her own fantasy - in her fantasy land, her eyes were closed, the image of the man who was touching her was irrelevant. What he looked like she didn't know, but what she could hear was his voice. A voice which had the ability to make her quiver, to set her skin on fire. His cock thrust into her, his fingers swept over her wet, engorged clit, and she was surrounded by his voice, murmuring, saying her name, whispering against her ear. His thrusts started out soft, and then he began to fuck her hard.

In fantasy land, she would feel the sensation of the mystery man's hard length thrusting into her and his fingers toying with her clit until climax and then they would cuddle and kiss and perhaps go for a round 2. In the real world, the world that was Gabriella and her imagination and her toy - her cell phone began to ring the moment before she reached her climax. It was too late to halt the climax, just five seconds earlier and she would have been frustrated but nonetheless it would've been halted, however it was too late. She let the phone ring out, attempting to drown out the peppy _Raise Your Glass_ ringtone. She reached her climax and came down, feeling slightly less satisfied due to the interruption – it was like she'd kind of gotten there but with a feeling of awkwardness. Her phone began to ring again as she laid in bed with her nightgown still around her waist and with a feeling of irritation, she picked it up from her nightstand to check the caller ID.

It was after hours. She felt somewhat flustered as she tried to decide whether to answer – it was like she was concerned she'd secretly be on camera, that they'd see her current location and mussed up state.

"Hello this is Gabriella," she answered, somewhat cautiously.

"_Hi, Gabriella, it's Troy, I'm so sorry to bother you."_

Immediately she felt herself melt at the sound of his tone – the syllables of her name falling from his lips in the same tone and intonation as her mystery man. And then she realised the fantasy that she was falling back into was not exactly appropriate given that she was being called on her work cell and so therefore, the conversation at hand was going to be work related.

"Troy!" she squeaked out, blinking quickly and attempting to calm herself, still coming down from her high.

_"I'm so sorry... did I um... are you okay?"_

"I'm fine! I was just um... I heard my phone ringing and I had to run to grab it in time," she quickly fibbed, doing her best to catch her breath. She hauled herself out of bed, flipping on the light and grabbing her dressing gown from the hook on the back of her door to wrap it around her.

_"Oh."_ He seemed to take her word for it quickly, and she thanked some higher being for the quick thought and excuse she'd come up with. _"I'm sorry to call you so late and on a weekend, but we've had a slight issue with one of your clients, I know things have been strained lately with them and I needed your input to make sure I don't make things worse."_

"It's fine Troy, you can call me any time. You can tell your colleagues to leave me alone, but I know when you call it's actually relevant," she remarked. "I hope I'm coherent... I've had a couple of wines."

He laughed. _"I wouldn't have known if you hadn't told me."_

"What's the situation?"

They went through the issue – one of the clients were wanting a specific set of research which Gabriella had been working on to be fast tracked with results in earlier – within the next few hours.

"Do you want me to call them?"

"_No! That's why we're here. I tried liaising with one of the lab guys but you know what it's like over the weekend – it's a bunch of college kids. If we fast track, it's not going to be your quality."_

"Tell the client that."

"_Seriously?"_

"Yes. We have to align their expectations, they need to realise that I'm the one with the skills and the background knowledge of the project. I can get stuck into it early tomorrow, but if they won't want to be risking the quality of the data, they'll just have to wait. Tell them that."

Troy hummed in agreement. _"Okay. Okay got it. Just wanted your tick of approval, since they'll be pissed and you'll have to deal with it tomorrow."_

"I look forward to it," she said wryly.

He laughed. _"Do you want me to call you back and let you know what they say?"_

"Nah. Don't ruin my precious few hours of remaining weekend. Just e-mail me and let me know."

"_You got it boss."_

They wrapped up the phone call – despite him having intruded upon her weekend, she found herself lamenting the discontinuation of their call. She lay back down on her bed, flopping down and closing her eyes, placing her cell phone back onto its spot on the bedside table.

She still felt unfulfilled, the interruption to her private time having soured the climax. Falling back into bed, she found her eyes drifting closed again, his voice surrounding her.

Maybe round 2 was an option, even in the real world.


	7. SIX

_**SERENDIPITY**_

SIX

_~Monday 5 December, 2011 ~ _

Gabriella was settled in her tub chair by the window. It was her favourite place to sit in her one bedroom apartment in Foster City. She didn't particularly have a wonderful view but there was something lovely about curling up with a blanket, a hot cocoa and a book and gazing out the window into the starry sky. She'd forgone the book and instead had her cell phone in hand on speaker phone, chatting to her mother. They kept in regular contact, despite currently living a long distance away. Her mother had lived a nomadic life for years, for all of Gabriella's teenage years, and it was only three years earlier that Maria had settled in Chicago.

"I don't like that you work so hard, darling."

"I guess you instilled that quality in me," Gabriella teased.

Maria sighed. "Not one of my finest parenting influences."

"Don't even say that. A strong work ethic is a good quality and I'm glad that you instilled that in me. Your work ethic has given you all kinds of opportunities, I just want to open up my future. I already have senior management paying attention to my work. I just have to get through this period of being understaffed and then I'll start to look for an internal transfer into a different department where it can just be about the work that I love, and not about everything that I don't like about the job."

"Make sure you do that sooner rather than later, mija. Do you even have time for anything else? Friends, dating? Any prospects on the horizon?"

"I'm a young, independent, career focused woman. I don't need a boyfriend," Gabriella chanted in a well rehearsed mantra, the kind that single girlfriends chant to each other after a depressing break up or on a sad Valentine's Day to mask the feeling of loneliness.

"You don't need a man, but you can't deny the _want _for one."

"Don't they say that 50 percent of relationships these days stem from meeting in the workplace?"

"I haven't heard you talking about any men who you are interested in from work."

Gabriella was quiet. She was the kind of person who had an open book expression, whose voice was incapable of hiding the truth. She wore her heart on her sleeve. Her silence at the statement for just a beat longer than acceptable rang a bell in Maria's ear.

"Unless... is there a man from work?" Maria prodded, excitement in her tone. It had been a few years since she'd been able to do boy talk with her daughter.

"Um... I don't know?" Gabriella said questioningly.

"Mija - explain."

"There's... okay. So you know how my company has clients all around the world? And has 24 hour needs?"

"Yes."

"So we're open 24 hours a day. There's a couple of teams, one is like, our technical team, who continue to monitor the research and to deliver the lab results. But we also have our call centre - so they field the calls from our clients who are chasing up on results or who are placing a new request, and they are responsible for making sure this is divided up among the technical team, during the hours when our main office isn't there."

"Okay..." Maria said slowly, following the explanation but not sure how it linked exactly to the boy talk.

"At close of business each day we call through to the call centre and go through anything which is outstanding or needs to be actioned. We call it our 'handover.' I do our handover most days, I make the call to our call centre in Oakland. And... when I do the handover, there is this particular man who I deal with most days."

Maria gasped in understanding. "So... we're talking about a colleague, in another office, who..."

"... who I've never met," Gabriella finished, biting her lip and then sighing. "But there's just something... I think it's crazy but Kelsi says that I should just pursue it, go for it, carpe diem and so forth. I just... there's something about the way that I can talk to him, we laugh and we joke and we tease. And his voice... do you believe that you can just _know _that someone is sexy by listening to their voice?"

"Mija, do you know anything about this man? He could be any age, he could be married, he could..."

"I know a little. He works two full time jobs, he's a teacher by day. A teacher! That's... really endearing. It means that he's smart, I know he's been to college, he's good with kids. He teaches PE, so obviously he's fit. Anyone who can have the stamina to work two full time jobs must be fairly young, but if he's a college graduate and already teaching then I can assume he's at least 22. And he's not once mentioned having a family, I don't know what sort of wife would tolerate him working two full time jobs, and Jason, the sales rep, told me he's single..."

"You've thought a lot about this, haven't you?"

"I... I guess I have." Saying it all out loud emphasised to Gabriella that she'd thought about it a lot more than she had realised she had - she'd mulled over the pros and the cons, the likelihood of whether they could actually be compatible.

"Goodness knows I haven't heard you talk about any man with a thrill in your voice like you have right now, not for a long time. But it seems tricky mija - a crush is all well and good, but you don't want it to just lead to heartache."

"That's why I'm wary. I... I guess we've been flirting on the phone for a little while but it's only been over the last week or so that I realised that I'd actually been insane enough to develop feelings for him."

"The heart wants what it wants."

"The heart can be a bitch sometimes."


	8. SEVEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

SEVEN

_~ Tuesday December 6th, 2011 ~ _

On Monday – Thursday afternoons, Kelsi had stopped volunteering to look after making the phone call to Oakland when their work day came to a close. She would put together their handover e-mail some days but leave the phone call to Gabriella. Kelsi didn't know Troy and she didn't know anyone who worked at Oakland so there wasn't really anything subtle she could do to help push Gabriella in the right direction of at least knowing whether her crush was a ludicrous idea or whether there could actually be something there. But she could allow maximum opportunities for Gabriella to speak with Troy, in the hope that the more often they spoke, the friendlier the conversation would be and the more she could get to know him.

On Tuesday evening, Kelsi was still at her desk finalising a few things whilst Gabriella was on the phone. They'd had a really good day, and had nothing to handover – it was just a formality to call to handover and identify there were no action points. Evidently, the Oakland call centre was pretty quiet as well.

"_I was counting on you to give me something to do," _Troy complained. _"None of the offices I look after have given me anything! I won't know what to do with myself. I might be able to like, work on some marking or do a lesson plan!"_

Gabriella giggled at his mock disappointment. "Isn't that a good thing?"

"_If I was in the mood, yeah, but I'm not today. Typical."_

"I'm hanging around here for another half hour, just killing some time. We had the radio on and apparently there's been a big pile up and traffic is still chaotic, even though it's been cleared. I _hate _sitting in traffic jams."

"_Feel free to entertain me, since you're killing time." _He lowered his voice, and added, _"I'm working with a really boring team tonight, too. Don't tell them I said that."_

"Your secret is safe with me," she laughed.

"_Hey uh... just curious, is anyone from your office going to the company Christmas party on Friday?"_

Gabriella blinked. It wasn't a question she'd been expecting. "Um... some of my colleagues are, I'm sure, but I don't think I am. It's kind of a pain, getting a bus all the way into the city and then having to come back and... I don't know. It's not really my scene." She paused – and then reconsidered her answer, when presented with the sudden thought that maybe _he_ was going. "Are you going?"

There was a brief pause, and then he answered, _"Nah. I'm just a call centre bitch."_

She didn't like to hear him speaking about himself in a self deprecating manner. "You're _so_ much more than that!"

"_I guess for me, this isn't my life's work, you know? It's just some cash on the side. Some of the others are going and they want me to go but... I don't think I'll bother."_

"You've probably got better things to go, places to go rage at," she laughed.

He snorted. _"Seriously, 3pm Friday, I check out. I drive home like a zombie and I crash hard. If I ever do go out, it's after having a nap."_

"Which is totally understandable, given your diabolical schedule," she said sympathetically.

An e-mail popped up on Gabriella's screen – Kelsi had e-mailed from her desk saying _Tell lover boy I said hi. _Gabriella immediately broke out into a cough.

"_You okay? You sound like you're getting sick,"_ Troy's concerned voice came over the phone.

"Um... no... just swallowed some water and it went down the wrong way," Gabriella said, glaring at Kelsi who giggled.

"_Oh okay. As long as you're okay."_

"I'm fine," she assured him.

"_Anyway... I'd love to chat all night but as quiet as my states are, I think some of the others are getting slammed so I'd better help out. Even if they never help me when I'm slammed."_

"Karma, Troy; you're a good person, and good things come to good people," Gabriella said wisely.

"_One can only hope. Anyway, you have an awesome night, hope you avoid that nasty traffic."_

"Good night," she said, and with that feeling of sadness in the pit of her stomach every time she ended their phone calls, she hung up the phone.

And then turned to glare at Kelsi – who now had Jason hovering by her desk, a common interaction in their office. If Kelsi felt like she had the right to tease and prod at Gabriella about some harmless friendly talk over the telephone with Troy, then Gabriella could've plastered billboards all around the San Francisco Bay area accusing Kelsi and Jason of having sex in secret.

"Kelsi! What the hell!" Gabriella snapped.

Kelsi giggled, blushing. "Sorry, I was kidding, just playing with you."

"Did I hear you tell someone that you aren't coming to the Christmas party?" Jason asked.

Jason was a notorious party animal – he kept it out of work hours, he wasn't the type to show up hung over, but they knew that whenever there was a farewell or engagement party or any excuse at all to get together, that he'd be there – and that he'd be the one rallying up everyone to come along.

She winced. "Um... maybe?"

"Seriously, you work a thousand hours a week, when the company is offering you free alcohol and food – you take it! Take very inch that they'll give you."

Gabriella sighed. "I just... I don't know. I'm fine going out with just the girls but the whole... drunken mingling thing. Not my scene. If it was a sit down dinner it would be okay but it's more of a canape thing, isn't it?"

"Who cares? You should come either way," Kelsi encouraged her. "We're going."

"I don't mingle with any of the big execs, just the cool people," Jason pointed out. "I can show you who to avoid, who is worth your time."

"All the cool people are here right now, aren't they?" Gabriella teased.

Jason pointed at himself. "You're looking at him, naturally," he said with a wink. "But seriously, you have to come."

"By the end of tomorrow, I will have convinced you to come," Kelsi declared with a firm nod.

Gabriella sighed, resigning herself to the fact that Kelsi could be an awfully persuasive person – she might be petite but she was a force to be reckoned with, and sometimes it was easier to just go with the flow than try to argue.


	9. EIGHT

_**SERENDIPITY**_

EIGHT

~_Wednesday December 7__th__, 2011 ~ _

Jason worked in sales and business development, and so his role had him out on the road depending on where his various client meetings were. Technically Palo Alto was his main office, but he would flit between the different offices. He'd had a 2pm meeting in Richmond and so decided to finish his afternoon at the Oakland office. Oakland had an interesting vibe. The Palo Alto office were workaholics, but they were a whole lot more entertaining. Oakland's regular day staff were either in at 7 and out at 3; or in at 9 and would walk out at exactly 5pm – they had the after hours team come into the building and so on some subconscious level it served to force them out the door. Jason had come from an after hours background in his early days working for the company and he knew a few members of the team. They were a good bunch and he enjoyed being around when they came in, bringing a different life into the usually bland Oakland walls.

On that particular evening, their seemed to be a particularly fun mood in the air. He emerged from the separate, private office space he'd taken over for a few hours into the main open floor plan hot desk space to say a quick hi and bye to the team, greeting the afternoon shift manager, Taylor McKessie and taking the time to get some feedback about some of the issues they'd experienced with one of Kelsi Nielson's clients from Palo Alto.

"Troy could tell you a bit more about that, he was pretty instrumental in getting that relationship developed with their night time contact," Taylor told Jason, and led him over to Troy's corner of the room.

Troy was in the midst of a phone call and held up his finger, indicating that he needed an extra minute. He laughed into the phone. "You as well, Gabriella, speak to you soon... of course, I always look forward to it. Have a good night."

Taylor smirked, arms folding across her chest. Troy sighed, glaring at her, anticipating what she was going to say. "Not a word!"

She held up her palms defensively. "Can you give Jason a run down on the outcome of the new expectations we set with _Rawlings Co._ after the long winded e-mail chain we had to respond to?"

Troy rolled his eyes. "What a pain in the ass they are. I don't know how Kelsi puts up with them!"

"Ah, Kelsi's a firecracker, a little pocket rocket. She just charms the pants off them," Jason laughed.

Troy went through the teleconference he'd coordinated with the night shift supervisor and the outcomes they'd been able to reach about realigning communication expectations between their divisions. Jason nodded approvingly, taking a few quick notes onto a pad he'd pulled from his briefcase.

"Great, all sounds good," he said with a nod. "Thanks for that, just thought I'd touch base before heading home."

"Where abouts do you live?" Troy asked conversationally.

"San Mateo. I worked here today because I had a meeting in Richmond," Jason explained.

"You're based at Palo Alto, yeah?"

"Mostly, yeah, but I'm here sometimes, and also sometimes at the city office. Do you ask for a reason?"

Troy paused. "Oh um... just curious. I talk to the girls over there regularly, it'd be great to meet them. I can't help but wonder what they're like."

"They're a fun bunch – work far too hard if you ask me, but I guess you gotta do what you gotta do to get the job done."

"Yeah, Gabriella always seems pretty ragged when I talk to her."

Jason smirked. "Gabriella Montez?" he asked innocently.

"Um, yeah... we do handover together most days. You know her?" Troy's attempt to sound aloof was a complete fail, but Jason decided to play it cool and not call him on it straight up.

"Yeah, I do."

"What uh... what's she like?"

Jason didn't answer the question directly, and instead, answered it with another question.

"Are you coming to the Christmas party on Friday night?"

Troy shrugged. Truthfully he hadn't been incredibly keen - by the time his double job work week ended on Friday afternoon, he tended to go home and collapse into a heap. There had been one reason why he'd been contemplating going, but that reason was seemingly not relevant."Not sure."

"She is."

Troy cocked his head. "Oh? She said she wasn't."

Jason nodded. "Yup. She wasn't going to, but one of the other Palo Alto girls is talking her into it."

"Interesting..."

Troy had thought about trying to orchestrate some reason why he needed to go to the Palo Alto office, or thought about when they'd next have some sort of company wide awards or training. He hadn't even really thought about the Christmas party - she'd led him to believe it wasn't the kind of event that interested her.

"For the record - she is smoking hot," Jason offered. "One of those like... intelligent women who don't realise how hot they are, you know? She dresses fairly conservatively but you just know that underneath the demure knee length skirts and blouses, there's a banging body."

With the last name Montez he was guessing she had Mexican background, so he imagined dark hair. Her voice led him to imagine her as being quite petite, which was fine for him because he was on the shorter side himself. His faraway gaze as he was tyring to form that mental picture wasn't lost on Jason, and it occurred to Troy that he hadn't responded immediately.

"Oh I uh... I wasn't... I'm just curious. We talk almost every day, you know?" Troy was trying to sound dismissive, but he'd pretty much given himself away.

"Yeah, sure. Curious. Right, gotcha," Jason said with a wink. "I hear ya."

Troy rolled his eyes. "Shut up, man."

"Anyway, Christmas party - that's your best bet."

"Christmas party? What is this about the Christmas party?" Taylor asked.

"I was just telling Troy it'll be a good opportunity to meet some of the people from some of the other offices," Jason said.

Taylor smirked, glancing at Troy. "There's only one person from another office that Troy wants to meet."

Troy exhaled and glared at Taylor. "Why do you keep going on about this? Woman, you're like a dog with a bone, you don't give up on it!"

"Troy, if I recorded you having a conversation with her and played it back to you, you couldn't possibly sit there and deny it. I know you're like, that guy, who gets away with things from being charming and cute, but you go to this whole other level when she is involved."

"I think the party will be fun anyway, from what all I hear, all you do is fucking work man. You need to let loose. Whether she was going or not, you of all people should be there," Jason advised.

"I'll see if I can swing it," Troy said casually.

With the prospect that she would be there – he would make sure that he could swing it.


	10. NINE

_**SERENDIPITY**_

NINE

_~ Friday December 9, 2011 ~ _

The company had arranged for a minibus to drive those who were attending the Christmas party from Palo Alto to the venue in San Francisco. _Inspire _had rented the function room of a fancy hotel, with all employees from offices all around the San Francisco Bay area invited to attend. The bus was due to arrive at the Palo Alto office 5:15pm; the party was commencing at 6:30pm. A decent run of traffic would have the drive from Palo Alto to take about 45 minutes, but at peak time of day it could take double that time.

They all took turns stepping away from their desks in the afternoon to get ready. Gabriella had begrudgingly brought along a cocktail dress, figuring that if she was going to attend she may as well take the opportunity to bring a part of her wardrobe which rarely saw the outside world out to play. Tanya, one of the receptionists, took it upon herself to give each of the women a final seal of approval as they emerged in dresses, touched up make up and hair styled – and when Gabriella emerged, she gasped.

"You! You've been hiding a vixen under all of these knee length skirts and demure blouses, haven't you?"

Gabriella was the kind of person who had a different perception of herself than other people did. She didn't think there was anything particularly out of the ordinary about her dress selection. It was red – appropriately Christmas themed – with thin straps, a slightly playful but not inappropriate plunging neckline, cinched at the waist, with an A line skirt which wrapped around. At the back the skirt was knee length, but the line cut up at the front, resting just above her knees. Her typical side ponytail had been pulled out, she'd just allowed her dark curls to hang loose. Simple silver strappy heels, silver jewellery and a touch more eye make up than usual and she was ready to go.

"This old thing?" Gabriella said dismissively, waving her hand away. She headed back to her desk to finalise her work for the week. She wasn't the type to leave the office unless her work was organised – not even on Christmas party eve.

She was trying to concentrate but the office had already pretty much checked out, there was pretty much no hope of any productivity. Martha, who was coming back to work on Monday, decided she wasn't going to let her sick leave prevent her from attending and arrived at the office at 4:30pm, looking stunning and ready to go out for a night on the town. Everyone gushed and hugged her, pleased to see her looking healthy and fresh again – her last week at work before being diagnosed with mono involved memories of her being run down and ridiculously ill. With her colleague's arrival, even Gabriella emerged from her land of focus, closing down her report and concluding that it was best completed on Monday when she could concentrate.

They succeeded in arriving at 6:45pm: they didn't quite get on the road on time due to a couple of the ladies still fussing around in the bathroom with their hair and make up, and then traffic had been utterly horrendous, and they'd had a mid trip break at a gas station due to a few weak bladders on the mini bus. Gabriella felt a slight knot in her stomach as they entered the function room. She, Kelsi and Martha stood by the doorway momentarily, glancing around the room. It was lavashly decorated with silver themed Christmas decorations and fairy lights. It was a canape style event, there were a couple of groupings of lounge chairs and coffee tables in the corners but most of the room was just free standing room, with tall tables around for groups to mingle around and rest their drinks on. A bar was at one end, but servers were walking around taking around glasses of beer, wine and champagne, as well as servers with platters of canapes. Off one side of the room was a balcony, with a gorgeous view of the bay lingering outside.

"Look, champagne!" Martha exclaimed, waving over one of the servers who was carrying a tray of champagne glasses.

"Good evening ladies," he greeted them, allowing each of them to take a glass of champagne.

"Should you even be drinking?" Gabriella asked, raising her eyebrows at Martha.

"I'll just have a few, get into the festive spirit. Besides, I don't need a lot of alcohol to have a great time," she declared, and Gabriella knew it was true. Martha was the type who created her own fun wherever she went.

That was exactly what happened – Martha disappeared, having seen someone she did a training course with a few months earlier and Gabriella and Kelsi were left to their own devices. They hung out with other people from their office, occasionally meeting someone new when they were introduced. About a half hour after they'd arrived, Jason approached them, looking dashing in a dark grey suit with a black shirt, from which he'd removed the tie to dress down slightly. He'd been in the city that day and had arrived separately to his Palo Alto colleagues.

"Hi ladies," he greeted them, standing close to Kelsi. "You both look absolutely smoking hot."

Gabriella wasn't lost on the hand which Jason had rested on the small of Kelsi's back.

"And you wear a suit every other day in the office," Gabriella teased. "But nonetheless, you look handsome yourself."

"Removing my tie was a long winded process of getting ready," he joked. "Come on, let's go mingle, I'll introduce you to anyone who you _should_ know."

Kelsi was a little more open to mingling, as long as Jason was doing the introductions and she wasn't having to go interrupt strangers conversations herself to say hello. Gabriella on the other hand had much less interest in mingling. She was more inclined to stick with the people she knew. Really though, it was no different to the way that Gabriella approached her every day life. In college, she'd never been one to run around at parties and get to know different people. She made her few friends through her classes and study groups and major stream and she was content.

Jason knew a few of the people around, due to his working around at different offices, and started out introducing the girls to some of their counterparts in the city office. The group exchanged polite conversation for a little while before Gabriella excused herself, disappearing to the bathroom. She took her time, checking her phone, reapplying lipgloss. When she returned back to the group, Jason excused himself and the girls, citing that he wanted to introduce them to some other people. Gabriella didn't realise that he had a particular mission. Jason was leading them in the direction of a few people standing around one of the tables, a woman with a glass of white wine and two men, each with a beer. Gabriella blinked sharply, her eyes landing upon one of the men who was sipping a beer, and then placing it back on the table, face lighting up as he laughed. He was wearing grey pants, a white shirt with a grey thin sweater. His face was immaculately sculpted, his beauty almost painfully perfect. She felt herself immediately blush and tear her eyes away, not wanting to get caught staring, although if she had her way then she'd be able to sit staring at him for hours. She then realised that it was this man of perfection and his companions who Jason was leading she and Kelsi straight toward. As they drew closer, not only was he utter perfection but now she was mesmerised by his sparkling blue eyes.

"Hey guys!" Jason greeted the trio. ""How does after hours run if you guys are here?"

The beautiful woman with the chocolate complexion laughed, she and Jason kissing on the cheek. "I've no doubt that the team can manage."

Jason then shook the hands of each of the men, first the one with a mop of curly hair who had his arm around the woman's waist, and then the man whom Gabriella was now avoiding all eye contact with.

"Taylor wanted me here with her tonight more than she wanted me to do my shift, so I swapped," the curly haired man explained, teasing his female companion and squeezing her hip.

"I never work tonight," the blue eyed man spoke. "So I was in the clear from the beginning."

Gabriella took in a sharp breath - she knew that voice. She knew that voice anywhere.

"Ladies, I believe you all actually somewhat know each other. This is Taylor McKessie, Chad Danforth, and this is..."

"Troy..." Gabriella found herself finishing his sentence, her voice clearly indicating her shock.

Troy's eyes widened, he snapped his head up, looking straight at her. He knew her voice – even with just one word.

"Gabriella."


	11. TEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

TEN

Taylor, Chad and Troy walked into the Christmas party a little late, it was around 7pm when they arrived. They'd missed the main bus which the company had hired for staff from the Oakland branch because Taylor was fussing around with the after hours team, making sure that the supervisor who was covering for her was across everything – it was only his second shift supervising. They had elected to walk the couple of blocks from their office to the BART station to get across the bay, and then to cab charge to the venue, saving a bit of time due to the chaos of traffic during peak hour, especially on a Friday evening during holiday season. Troy was nervous, he had fussed with his hair and asked multiple times if he looked ridiculous, questioning if he should've worn a suitor whether just blue jeans and a button down and sports coat would've been more appropriate than his shirt and sweater combo. Taylor and Chad exchanged knowing looks – Troy wasn't the type to care about impressing the execs or managers. His nerves were about one person and one person only.

When they arrived at the venue, they split up with separate tasks – Taylor claimed them a table, Troy headed to snag them all a drink and Chad beelined for one of the servers bringing around canapes, loading up with some goodies, before regathering at the table Taylor had snagged.

"Honey, don't listen to what I'm about to say," Chad opened upon his return, speaking to Taylor, before looking at Troy. "Bolton, don't turn around straight away, but check out the the smoking hot girl in the green dress by the bar. She looks like your type."

Troy rolled his eyes, but casually turned around to where he had his back to the direction of Chad's gaze, spotting a group of people, including a petite girl with brown hair in an updo, wearing glasses and a cute green dress which had silver sequin decoration along the waist and also along the neckline. Troy nodded approvingly but wasn't particularly interested and turned back to Chad and Taylor.

"She's cute," was his casual assessment.

"Ah, let me guess, with a name like Montez, you're looking for a sort of olivey complexioned dark haired girl, right?" Taylor said with a smirk.

"You said it, not me," Troy remarked.

"Oh hey, there's Jason with her!"

Troy glanced around again, now seeing someone turn back from where he'd been grabbing a drink refill from a server and handing it across to the girl in the green dress. Chad gave Jason a small wave and a head nod in greeting.

"Maybe she didn't come," Troy said glumly, turning back to his beer.

"You can ask him now, he's headed over," Chad said. "With _two_ hot girls now, seriously, how does he manage to pull not one but _two_ hot girls?"

Troy looked up again, semi curious about the second hot girl who had appeared, and blinked. The second woman who was accompanying Jason was undoubtedly one of the hottest women he'd ever seen. She was wearing a seductive red dress which accentuated her hot body in all the right ways. Troy thought to himself that she had to be some kind of a receptionist.

"Hey guys!" Jason greeted the trio. ""How does after hours run if you guys are here?"

Taylor laughed, she and Jason kissing on the cheek in greeting. She wasn't about to confess that she'd nearly not come, not wanting to leave her team behind. "I've no doubt that the team can manage."

Chad shook Jason's hand, and then so too did Troy. He was avoiding looking at the woman in the red dress, for fear that he'd blatantly leer at her hotness. He did give the woman in the green dress a friendly smile.

"Taylor wanted me here with her tonight more than she wanted me to do my shift, so I swapped," Chad said, squeezing Taylor on the hip

"I never work tonight," Troy pointed out."So I was in the clear from the beginning."

He looked up when the red dress hottie let out a strange gasp, cocking his head at her.

"Ladies, I believe you all actually somewhat know each other," Jason said, directing the comment to his companions. "This is Taylor McKessie, Chad Danforth, and this is..."

The woman in the red dress spoke – and with one word, it all suddenly made sense.

"Troy."

Troy's eyes widened, he snapped his head up, looking straight at her. He knew her voice – even with just one word.

"Gabriella."


	12. ELEVEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

ELEVEN

There was a moment of silence among the group as Troy and Gabriella stared at one another: knowing silence among their colleagues, and for both of the pair, a bewildered silence.

Jason innocently said, "Oh, of course you guys would know each other, you do handover most days, don't you Gabs?" Jason said.

"Um... that I do," she managed to say. She was finding herself at a loss for words, meeting Troy was all too overwhelming and adding to it that she was meeting Troy who she had been unknowingly checking out, and now she felt yet another layer of awkward. Gabriella could feel her cheeks flushing, and the flushing was only getting worse upon the realisation that she was heating up.

"It's nice to put a face to the name and voice," Troy said.

"Uh-huh," she said, somewhat stupidly, and she felt immediately jealous that he'd been able to string a coherent sentence together and yet she hadn't.

Gabriella was too busy staring at her hands to notice the once over and look of approval that Troy gave her.

"I'm Kelsi Nielson," Kelsi piped up, introducing herself. Normally she would've felt annoyed at being left out but the reality was that witnessing the meeting of Troy and Gabriella was far more epic.

"Oh hey! Sorry for waking you up last night," Troy apologised. He'd had an urgent query from a client that only Kelsi could help him resolve and so he'd had to resort to calling her work cell at 11:30pm.

"It's fine, if I'd come in this morning without that crisis averted, I would've never gotten out this afternoon to be here tonight!"

"You girls both look amazing, I love your dresses!" Taylor said, complimenting Kelsi and Gabriella.

"Thank you," Kelsi said with a smile. "This afternoon was bedlam, everyone running around and getting ready. I think Gabriella was the only person working."

Troy smiled. "That'd be right, such a workaholic."

She glanced slyly at him, finding her voice. "Pot, kettle, black," she remarked.

Troy laughed. "Touche."

"It's so cool to meet you guys finally!" Kelsi exclaimed. "Is anyone else here from your office?"

"Ryan is around for a few hours, he has to start work at midnight, sucker," Chad laughed.

"Oooh, we should tell Martha that he's here," Kelsi said, nudging Gabriella. "Since they do the morning handover most days."

"Oh, is Martha back? She's been on sick leave for a while, yeah?" Chad asked.

"Yes, she's starting back on Monday, but she wanted to come along tonight," Kelsi explained.

"Where is she? I'd love to meet Martha. It's so lovely to meet all you girls! If any of you ever want to come work for Oakland, I can call in some favours with the big bosses," Taylor said with a laugh.

"You should come work for Palo Alto," Kelsi returned. "Join our all star team."

"I'd love to, but the hours I do are perfect for me, I'm studying my masters at UC Berkeley."

"Are you really? I had no idea," Gabriella said, with surprise.

Taylor nodded. "I landed this job while I was doing my undergraduate and they offered me the evening supervisor role when I decided to stay on and do my masters. It's pretty perfect."

"Looks like Martha has met Ryan on her own," Jason said, gesturing over to where Martha had befriended a group of people close to the door heading out ont the balcony.

"I want to meet Ryan!" Kelsi said.

"Let's go, I'll introduce you," Jason said. "And you guys can meet Martha, and I can see Tanya over there too."

"Um... I'm just going to grab another drink at the bar, I'll catch up," Gabriella told them.

"I'll come with you," Troy quickly volunteered.

Gabriella blushed and nodded, allowing him to escort her toward the bar.

"I thought you weren't coming tonight," she commented as they waited to be served.

"I wasn't," Troy said truthfully. "I uh... someone convinced me that it would be a good opportunity to meet some different people. I'm really glad I came now."

"I'm glad you're here too," Gabriella said quietly, ducking her head.

Troy held her champagne glass up to the server at the bar, collecting a refill for her champagne and also a refill for his beer, handing her the now full glass.

"To meeting new people?" he proposed as a toast, holding up his glass.

She nodded. "To meeting new people," she agreed, and they clinked their glasses together.

"I just want to say, Gabriella, it is seriously so awesome to meet you. I mean, the others too but... especially you." He smiled at her brightly, his smile setting her alight.

"I feel the same," she admitted. "I um... I feel I'm not giving a good impression. I feel a little tongue tied. I'm um... I can be a bit socially awkward."

"Hey, it's just me. You've cried to me, bitched to me, laughed with me," he coaxed. "No need to be tongue tied."

She bit her lower lip – she couldn't confess to him the truth that her socially awkward behaviour was directed specifically at him, it was a part of the affect which he had upon her. They were walking slowly toward a vacant table where they paused to rest their drinks, continuing to chat and get to know one another.

"Are you working through the holidays?" Gabriella asked. "You'd get a couple of weeks off from the school, right?"

"I do, but I'm working through with _Inspire_. Even though all of the clients have fewer requirements, we do a lot of coverage, we cover skeleton staff during business hours because there are some administrative and exec offices that are completely closed, plus some of our staff go away. I think I'll get some leave through Inspire over summer, go home, see my family, you know?"

"Where is home?"

"Albuquerque, New Mexico."

"And your parents are still there? Are they upset you're not coming home for Christmas?"

"Mom isn't saying it but I'm pretty sure she is. They don't like me working as much as I do, but my dad gets it. He's a teacher and in his first year of teaching he did some part time work teaching driving to help so he and mom could afford the down payment for our house."

"Some part time work is different to working two full time jobs," Gabriella pointed out. "Honestly, I don't know how you do it."

"Technically my work with _Inspire_ is part time," Troy pointed out defensively.

"You work Sunday to Thursday most weeks, and do what hours, 5 til midnight?"

"Yeah."

"Practically full time," she scoffed.

"The work with _Inspire_ is... it's kind of mind numbing, honestly. I don't have to think a lot. Just type and talk. But my day job is a lot of talking some days, sometimes I just feel like being quiet for a while. I think that's the hardest thing."

Gabriella nodded. She was fairly introverted, so she more than appreciated the serenity that came with just being quiet sometimes. "I can understand that."

He gave her a smile, and then sighed. "Anyway, enough work talk, we've done plenty of work talk. It's boring. Tell me about you."

"About me?"

"Yeah. About you."

"Um... okay... I'm 24, I studied science at university, at Stanford..."

"That's all the boring stuff. Tell me something no one else knows."

"Um... I..." she paused, before confessing. "I love to sing."

"You love to sing?"

She nodded, a sparkle in her eyes. "When I was growing up I was always in church choir which I loved, but I tried to do a solo once and nearly fainted! But when I'm alone... I love to sing. Like, I study sheet music and sing into my hairbrush pretending I'm a pop star. Singing makes me happy. It terrifies me, but it makes me happy."

He grinned, being presented with the cutest mental image of her jamming away into her hairbrush.

"That's so awesome," he laughed.

She was blushing. "Now that I've told you my deepest, darkest secret – hit me with one of yours."

He paused, contemplating his answer, before striking up a bout of bravery and responding teasingly.

"Deep dark secret of mine? Okay... here's a secret... so, when I saw Jason leading you girls over and I didn't know it was you, I was totally checking you out," he confessed with a teasing wink.

Gabriella gasped and giggled, feeling her cheeks heating up. "That's cheating, it's not deep and dark, and that just embarrasses me, Troy."

"Come on, a woman like you, when you put on a dress like that, you know that you look smoking hot, surely."

"And we have another case of calling the kettle black, Mr. Pot," Gabriella confessed.

Troy rolled his eyes but grinned – he knew that he was an attractive guy, and he had to admit that hearing her inadvertently say she thought he was hot gave him a bit of a boost. He gave her a wink, and responded with a simple, "Thank you."

She cleared her throat. "I'm just going to duck to the bathroom."

He nodded, and gestured over to where their group of colleagues – Kelsi, Martha, Ryan, Jason, Chad, Taylor and a few other randoms – were standing close to the doorway which led to the balcony. "I'm gonna head over there. Come over when you're done."

She nodded and escaped, leaving Troy gazing after her. He couldn't help but feel like somehow, even after just their initial meeting and conversation, that this woman had come into his life for a reason.


	13. TWELVE

_**SERENDIPTY**_

TWELVE

As Gabriella walked away heading to the bathroom, Troy's eyes focused directly on her ass. He was concentrating so hard that he didn't notice Jason and Chad come over from the group, and jumped when Jason's hand clapped on his back.

"I told you she was hot," Jason declared with a smirk.

Troy gave him a slightly dirty look, but couldn't even try to argue that her hotness was irrelevant to him. He'd been not far off gawking at her. Gabriella Montez was the most beautiful woman he'd ever encountered - and not only was she beautiful, but she had proven herself to be nice, charming, witty and intelligent.

"What I'm about to say is gonna make me sound like a douchey pussy but... have you ever like, met a woman, and just _known_?"

"Known what?" Jason asked, clearly confused.

Chad nodded, understanding what Troy meant. "Yeah."

"Was it like that with Taylor?"

"Pretty much. I didn't know _what_ it was, but I just knew that I couldn't let it be nothing, you know?"

"Yeah. That's exactly it." Troy was feeling a bit overwhelmed – it had been a while since he'd dated seriously, his life wasn't one which exactly led itself to the development of serious relationships, and yet it was his life which had allowed her to come into his life. He cleared his throat. "Come on, let's go back to the group. I told her to meet me over there."

"Don't want her to catch you gossiping about her, huh?" Jason laughed.

Troy nodded. "Something like that."

On his way over to the group, he snagged another beer and a champagne from a tray coming by with a server.

"Oh, is that for me?" Taylor greeted him.

He narrowed his eyes. "You're drinking chardonnay."

"The alcohol is free Troy, I'm not sure if the charm of buying a girl a drink is quite as relevant when it was free," Chad joked.

"The night is still young, there will be plenty of opportunities to impress," Taylor said.

Troy glared at him. It was one thing for Chad and Taylor to joke about it in their office in private, but to do it in front of Gabriella's immediate co-workers and friends was a completely different matter. "Not funny," he said, shooting each of them a look.

"What's going on?" Gabriella's voice said from behind, having emerged from the bathroom.

"Um... just talking about how the night is young," Troy said, smiling at her, hoping she didn't hear anything more. "Here, I grabbed this for you when they were coming past."

She smiled at him, accepting the outstretched glass. "How sweet, thank you."

Chad opened his mouth to say something, but with a glare from Troy closed his mouth.

Taylor cleared her throat and changed the conversation topic. "So... who else is here that we should meet?"

The group continued to chat and laugh. They broke off into separate groups, different people coming along to chat, some of them heading to the bar or the bathroom and getting distracted and drawn into another conversation.

But the one pairing that remained constant was Gabriella and Troy, standing side by side.

After three drink refills, an assortment of canapes and a variety of chit chat conversation, Gabriella and Troy found themselves standing alone when their whole group had slipped away simultaneously. They fell silent for a moment, both taking a drink together. Gabriella turned, looking out toward the balcony area.

"The view is so gorgeous out there," Gabriella said wistfully.

Due to the winter chill was only populated with a handful of people who were having a quick puff of a cigarette before ducking back into the warmth of the main room.

"Do you want to go look?" Troy asked, gesturing toward the doorway.

"Um... I kind of do, but just quickly," she agreed.

She pulled her cardigan out from her bag in preparation – her coat had been stashed in a corner of the room where all of the girls had dumped their purses and coats. Troy had strewn his coat across a bar stool nearby. He grabbed his coat, and then led the way forward to the door leading out to the balcony, holding it open for her and standing back to let her through the door first. She blushed, ducking her head and thanking him quietly for his gentlemanly gesture - a man with traditional manners was a treat in modern society. There was a heat lamp by the edge of the rooftop overlooking the city view, and he headed toward it.

The pair stood in a comfortable silence, both looking out at the view, at the pretty lights. Troy glanced over at Gabrielle and the look of serenity on her face – a look of serenity which was interrupted when she shivered. Even with the heat emanating from the heatlamp the air was still chilly. He frowned, and immediately shrugged off his jacket, handing it over.

"Oh, no, I couldn't," she protested.

"Please, it's fine. I'm wearing this sweater, I'm perfectly warm. You on the other hand look like you might turn into an icicle."

She accepted the jacket – mostly because she wanted to stay with him outside, but if she didn't accept the jacket she'd need to insist they return back into the warmth of the indoors shorty. She wrapped the warm wool coat around her, immediately feeling content from the warmth.

"Thank you." They fell back into silence again. Gabriella pulled out her Blackberry, and began to play around with the camera, attempting to capture a decent shot of the skyline. "I wish I was better at photography," Gabriella said, somewhat whimsically. "Whenever I see a view like this I just feel the urge to whip out my camera and take a series of skyline shots. But I've never been very good... the lights just never look quite right."

"Night shots can be tricky," Troy agreed. "I really like photography, I actually took some classes in college but I just never get time to do anything with it."

She chuckled. "Of course you wouldn't have any time. I don't understand how you have time to eat and sleep."

"I can't believe how fascinated you are about my two jobs thing. I know a few people who juggle more than one job - and I don't mean juggling multiple retail or waitressing jobs, either."

"I've heard of the concept, of course, but I'd never actually really talked to anyone who does it," Gabriella explained. "I think it's just... the concept is simple enough but when I break it down in my brain, when I actually contemplate just how hectic your life must be..."

"I've had about six red bulls since 3pm," Troy admitted with a laugh.

"See!"

"I'll never be rich," he said, very seriously. "I... if and hopefully when I get married, unless she's some super successful career woman, even with combined incomes, we're not gonna live in a mansion. The rewards from teaching aren't financial. It's solid, and steady, but I know what it is. The least that I can do, for my future, and for the future of any family that I might be a part of one day, is to at least get all my debt out of the picture, you know? Let's say I get married and we look at buying a house, getting a new car... then there's more loans. I'll just spend my whole life paying off loans. Instead what I'd rather do is get this lot of debt out of the way so that I can actually be able to afford to save that 10% of my salary. Does that make sense?"

"It does," Gabriella agreed. "And... it impresses me."

He grinned. "Thank you."

"So um... you're talking about marriage and a family... are these things on the cards any time soon?"

"I'm single," he confirmed.

"I see." Her voice was even – but on the inside, she felt joy at the confirmation.

"But... one day, yeah, I want all that. I grew up with those values, I guess, white middle class family and all."

"It's hard to believe you're not seeing anyone. I don't think I've ever met an attractive, intelligent man who admits to wanting the whole family thing on first meeting," she teased.

"I guess it's been a long time for me since I met someone who I felt... you know... chemistry with. Some women I know, they just date for the sake of it but... for me it's all about exploring chemistry."

"Chemistry," she echoed, glancing up at him.

He took the slightest of steps toward her, breaking the barrier of usual personal space and meeting her gaze.

His statement had been truthful. It had been a long time for him since he'd felt someone that he felt chemistry with. It had been a long time, and finally, he felt like that drought may have come to an end.

"Do you believe in chemistry?" he asked, voice low. He moved just a little closer, hovering just inches away.

Gabriella swallowed, options of possible responses flying through her mind. However before she could settle upon any of them, a voice from behind startled her.

"Gabriella! The buses are..." Gabriella immediately pulled back from Troy, whipping around to see an apologetic Kelsi. "... oh shit! I'm sorry I uh... I interrupted."

"No! We were talking... just talking... no... nothing... that's all," Gabriella stammered. "You... buses? Huh?"

"They're here to pick people up. It's 11pm," Kelsi explained. "Unless... um... you were gonna go out or something."

The lingering inference was that she might not be planning to go home that evening.

"No no, I'll be getting the bus back."

Kelsi nodded. "Okay... I'll go let them know you're coming."

"Yeah... I mean... unless you were going to um... go out or something."

"No, I'll get the bus back," Gabriella insisted quickly.

"Um... I'll see you out there, I'll let them know you're coming." Kelsi glanced at Troy, smiling. "Troy it was lovely to meet you."

"You as well, Kelsi," Troy said sincerely. "We'll speak soon, I'm sure."

She gave him a nod before disappearing. Troy looked back at Gabriella who was shrugging off his coat.

"Gabriella..." he said softly, a hand falling on her arm.

She cleared her throat and handed him back his coat.

"It was so lovely meeting you, Troy," she said, pulling her arm away. "I've had an awesome time chatting and getting to know you."

Awesome was an understatement.

"Yes... you too." She could hear the slight confusion in his tone, at her sudden abruptness.

"I'd really better go, I'm not keen on getting the train back on my own," she said, gesturing toward the front door. "I guess I'll talk to you next week?"

"Um... yeah, I guess so."

Even though it hurt – she walked away, leaving him behind.


	14. THIRTEEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

THIRTEEN

_~ Monday 12 December, 2011 ~_

On Monday morning, Gabriella just knew that people were looking at her. It wasn't exactly abnormal for some of her colleagues to be involved in trysts at parties and so yes, there would be gossip, but it wasn't a big deal. Apparently though, she wasn't able to spend an evening talking to a man without it being the hottest topic of discussion.

"So you and that cute guy from after hours, huh?" one of their receptionists, Tanya, said to Gabriella as they were both in the lunch room grabbing a mid morning coffee. It was the first direct mention that anyone had made of the reason for the stares.

Gabriella sighed and looked up at Tanya, answering truthfully, "We were just chatting, he's a nice guy."

Tanya smirked and raised her eyebrows. "Honey, if that's what the steam is like from when you're just talking, then it's only bound to be absolutely scorching when you finally get into the sack with him."

An open mouthed Gabriella spluttered out, "Excuse me?"

Quickly, Tanya realised that perhaps Gabriella wasn't the type who she could be so open with, so she tamed down her next comment. "Sorry, but... come on! We all saw the chemistry. He's hot, you're hot, you just said he's a nice guy. Aren't... well... you're interested, surely?"

"I prefer to keep my private life separate to my work life," Gabriella said, somewhat stiffly, and turned away with her cup of coffee.

At 12:30pm, Kelsi whisked Gabriella away from her desk, insisting that they go get lunch together. Gabriella tried to protest, citing things she needed to do and that she was just going to eat lunch at her desk, however Kelsi in her persuasive way won out in the end. Gabriella felt grateful to her friend because it was exactly what she'd needed, to get away from it all. They'd been seated in a cafe, placed orders, and had their drinks delivered - an iced tea for Kelsi and a diet coke for Gabriella - and just a minute after her glass had been set down in front of her, Gabriella began to vent.

"People are looking at me," Gabriella said, biting her lip. "I don't like people staring at me."

"It's just for today. They'll be over it tomorrow. You know how office gossip works!"

"I just... it wasn't like we were doing anything! I don't understand why people feel the need to talk about it at all."

"Because you guys were adorably cute, standing on your own, all close together, him lending you his coat..."

"And yet you and Jason make out in the corner and no one bats an eyelid!"

"Oh please, everyone knows that Jason and I have been casually involved for ages, it's old news," Kelsi said dismissively.

"I don't like being known for being someone who is in a relationship, especially not in my work life. I... I can't lie to you Kelsi he was... all this time when we've been joking around about my crush, I'd kind of built up two sets of expectations. One was the magic fantasy of who he was going to be and the way we'd get along, and I had my 'just in case' scenario where he was horrible and crude and an ass and the phone thing was just some sort of smokescreen. He's _better_ than the ultimate fantasy."

"And you're worried about..."

"I love this company. Sure, no one wants to stay in our entry level role forever, but I believe in this company and the work that we do and I can see myself wanting to work my way through the hierarchy here. I don't want some silly romance to get in the way of that. So... it's better to just let it go. It was a one off night of flirtation, time to retreat back to the real world."

"Gabriella, you don't _really_ work with him. He's not at our office. He's not going to be with the company forever – this is his second job, it's his teaching that he loves. You... you just described him as being better than the ultimate fantasy and you aren't the least bit interested in pursuing that because you're worried of what people will think of you?" Kelsi was absolutely incredulous at Gabriella's interpretation of the events.

"Today represents day one. What happens if I actually was to pursue this, what if he wanted to go on a date with me?"

"No one would care!" Kelsi said, rolling her eyes. "They wouldn't care in the slightest. As long as you keep it professional at work, no one cares - and hell, you can be a bit _un_professional at work and people still don't care."

Gabriella was quiet, playing with the ice in her drink with her straw, swishing it around.

"I think you're just using this an excuse. You're afraid of getting hurt, you're afraid it'll be too hard, and so this is your excuse."

Gabriella wasn't going to admit it, but Kelsi was extremely perceptive.

That afternoon, Gabriella refused to make the handover phone call. She left the room, making a convenient trip to the bathroom as Kelsi made the phone call.

That evening, Gabriella stared at her cell phone - willing it to ring. Willing for something to happen so that he'd have to call her to ask for advice.

She wanted to hear his voice.


	15. FOURTEEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

FOURTEEN

_~ Tuesday 13 December, 2011 ~_

Gabriella felt out of sorts all of Monday evening. She just felt like something was wrong, like something was amiss with the universe. Kind of like the feeling one might have if they're convinced they left the iron on – that she needed to be somewhere else, that she needed to have done something and had forgotten. She arrived at work Tuesday morning and quietly slipped into office, putting her lunch away into the fridge and moving into the cubicle area and sliding into her desk without greeting anyone. She logged into her computer, whilst it loaded she placed her bag away under the desk, pulled out her cell phone to set it beside her, grabbed the notebook and pen which she would have by her all day – it was a well practiced routine.

Finally her computer finished loading, and the first thing she opened was her Outlook. They appeared in chronological order, most recently received at the top, and so she always scrolled down to any communications which came through the previous evening first.

And immediately, an e-mail caught her eye.

Sender: Troy Bolton

Time: Yesterday, 11:30pm

Subject: Hi :)

She stared at the e-mail long and hard, just watching it in her inbox, not daring to open it yet. Finally, she took a lunge of bravery and clicked on the e-mail, eyes closing for a moment which merely enhanced the anticipation, before opening them and reading the e-mail slowly, carefully, taking in each syllable of each word.

_Hey,_

_I just wanted to drop you a line and tell you that I was really happy to have the opportunity to meet you on Friday, I had so much fun hanging with you. You're a beautiful woman, Gabriella, I feel honoured. I was a little bummed we didn't get to talk tonight. Anyway, I hope I'll speak to you soon._

_Troy_

In a 62 word e-mail – she counted them – he succeeded in reducing her back to being a pile of melting goo. She too felt ectastic that she'd met him – even if nothing came of their interactions other than heightening their work relationship, it was still an amazing experience to spend time with him after so long of dealing with each other over the telephone. But she couldn't lie any more – at the word beautiful she'd had to hold back from letting out a girlish shriek. And at his sentiment that he'd wanted to talk to her – she felt completely ridiculous for having avoided him.

A part of her wanted to forward the e-mail through to Kelsi and squeal with joy – but another part of her felt like she wanted to keep it to herself. It was special, like a secret, something that only she and Troy shared. And so she merely kept quiet and floated through the entire day. She spent most of her day crunching numbers and analysing data for one of the projects she was running for a client, at the tail end of the process, having completed the majority of the research component. She was so wrapped up in her work that she found herself only leaving her desk to go to the bathroom, grab a coffee refill and to bring her lunch back to her desk. She was on a roll and there was no point in interrupting the flow of productivity.

Around 4:30pm, Martha and Kelsi began to talk about getting ready to put together their handover document for after hours.

"We're going to handover right on 5pm today," Martha said, determination in her voice. "Not a minute later."

"You've been back for two days," Kelsi laughed. "You're already over it? You've been off for a month!"

"That's what this place does to you, it sucks the life out of you," Martha said cynically.

"Oh come on, it's not that bad," Gabriella said with a smile, one of the few comments she'd made during the whole day. She was in a strangely optimistic mood.

"You feel exactly the same way, you just don't complain as loudly as I do," Martha pointed out.

Martha wasn't exaggerating in her determination to leave on time. She had their e-mail put together, the phones diverted at 4:59pm, the e-mail sent, and the moment the clock switched over to 5:00pm she had picked up the phone and was dialling the Oakland phone number. Gabriella sat quietly at her desk, typing away at a report she was working on, but with one ear she was listening out to overhear the conversation that her colleague would be having. She felt a little put out – Martha hadn't even offered to let her hand over. Kelsi glanced over at Gabriella, about to say something, but decided to just keep quiet.

"Hi Chad, it's Martha from Palo Alto. I'm good!... Yeah I'm back... we're just on top of it today, had a good day. It's nice when we can walk out the door at 5pm," she laughed. "Oh..." Martha looked toward Kelsi and Gabriella and laughed. "Troy hasn't even arrived yet."

Martha paused and listened. "Oh, he just walked in."

"5:01pm? Not acceptable!" Kelsi tutted.

The girls all laughed. "Chad, you tell Troy that the team at Palo Alto are disappointed at his tardiness." They all laughed, and a moment later Martha burst into laughter. "Troy said in the background that we should lay off him, he had a rough day at his other job."

"No sympathy!" Kelsi shouted.

Martha went through her handover with Chad, who had said he'd pass on the information to Troy. Kelsi and Martha were both packed up and ready to go, Martha had her handbag over her shoulder and as she finished going through the handover with Chad, she hung up the phone and stood from her desk.

"Let's get out of here," she said gleefully.

"Do you need help with anything, Gabriella?" Kelsi asked.

"I'm just finishing up a report, it won't take long."

"You sure? I can stay keep you company."

"No no it's fine, seriously, ten minutes and I'll be done."

"Okay then."

The girls farewelled each other, leaving Gabriella and her report.

And her e-mail account.

She was itching to open an e-mail... he was just an e-mail away. She didn't like hearing that he'd had a bad day - especially not when she'd had a good one, and largely because of a simple gesture that he'd made.

She opened the e-mail that he'd sent to her which she hadn't yet responded to, paused, contemplated, then switched windows back to her report and continued typing. She finalised the report, sent it through to her managers, and then looked back to her empty e-mail screen.

Sender: Gabriella Montez

Time: 5:10pm

Subject: Re: Hi :)

_Hey,_

_Firstly... thanks for your e-mail. Sorry we couldn't chat yesterday, the girls have been really eager to walk out on time, I think it's the festive spirit. Before I've even had the chance to think about it, they're on the phone already!_

_I had a really great time with you as well. I wasn't sure what I'd ever expected if I was ever going to have the opportunity to meet you, but I can say with certainty that you exceeded my expectations! _

_Heard you came in late today... tsk tsk :) Heard you had a bad day at school – hope everything is okay._

_-Gabriella_

She hovered the cursor over the send button, wondering if it was appropriate, hovering over the send, moving it away and heading toward the close window button, and then back to the send until finally, she clicked the button - and of course, immediately bit her lip, worrying if she'd sounded stupid. She filtered through her inbox, and then an e-mail came back from him - immediately her worries floated away, a smile emerging onto her face.

Sender: Troy Bolton

Time: 5:15pm

Subject: Re: Re: Hi :)

_I know what you mean about festive spirit. The kids at school pretty much checked out at Thanksgiving – makes it hard for me to keep motivated when the kids are over it. I'm not really feeling all that festive this year, just looking forward to being on break from one job. _

_I think me confessing to thinking you were a hottie receptionist was already me confessing to my expectations being exceeded ;) I wish the party could've gone for longer. Kind of ended abruptly..._

_Haha, please forgive me, boss, for my tardiness ;) Although it makes me pleased to see you guys able to leave on time for once!_

_Yeah, pretty shit day. A kid threw up on me at 2:30pm. Had to go shower up and then I was waiting with the kid until his mom came to pick him up, normally he gets the bus but we had to call her to come get him. She didn't come until 4pm! I had to burn it to get here, and didn't have time to get dinner or anything._

Sender: Gabriella Montez

Time: 5:19pm

Subject: Re: Re: Re: Hi :)

_I'm working through this year, my mom is heading overseas this week for a few weeks and I don't really have any other family closeby. So I'm not really feeling the festive vibe either._

_It did end abruptly... sorry if I sort of ran away on you. I probably seemed kind of like a heinous bitch, but I didn't want to be late for the bus, you know._

_I suppose I'll forgive you, just this one time though, since it was Martha who had to deal with Chad and not me! :)_

_Omg, that sucks Ew. Feel bad for him, but so much ew. Guess I'm a typical girl... I probably would've puked myself if that happened. Do you guys have any food places nearby? You get a dinner break, don't you?_

Sender: Troy Bolton

Time: 5:16pm

Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Hi :)

_Sucks that you're working through, but at least then you'll have more leave stocked up? I'll be here, so if you get snowed under being one of the only ones there, you'll have to be sure you let me know. I'm more than a pretty face, you know!_

_Not a heinous bitch, I could never think that of you. It did feel a bit... unfinished. Like we didn't get to say goodbye properly, you know?_

_Thank you, because your forgiveness is important to me. ;)_

_Nah, not a typical girl thing, just a human thing. Nearly tossed my cookies too but kept it down. Yeah we get a break and there are a few places but I'm starving. I might order pizza, sometimes everyone gets together and pitches in some cash to do that._

Sender: Gabriella Montez

Time: 5:25pm

Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Hi :)

_We're not expecting it to be too busy, we've timed a lot of our projects so that they'll be finalised before people go on leave, but there's just bits and pieces that our team are working on that will be requiring monitoring and follow up. It's good to know that I've got the support anyway, from what I'm hearing it's going to be just me and a temp admin girl most of the week between Christmas and New Years!_

_Yeah... unfinished is how I felt. It's hard to articulate. I hope we get the chance to spend more time together._

_You're welcome :)_

_Glad you kept it down - you might not have lived that down yourself if the kids had seen you get sick! That sounds like fun, we never do things like that here. Hope you get through the night okay and you get fed :)_

_I need to get going – I actually have a few errands to run this evening. Talk to you soon._

_-Gabriella_

She paused, rereading over her e-mail – and hovered her mouse cursor over the line of

_'Yeah... unfinished is how I felt. It's hard to articulate. I hope we get the chance to spend more time together.'_

The line was leading, suggestive - and as bold as she was feeling embracing the new dynamic, walking the line somewhere between work colleague and friend, she wasn't quite that daring. Quickly, she added an ending to the sentence.

_'Yeah... unfinished is how I felt. It's hard to articulate. I hope we get the chance to spend more time together... you know, in training or something.'_

Satisfied with her amendment, she clicked the send button. She didn't wait for his reply – instead just logging off.

"Gabriella?"

Gabriella spun around in her chair, startled – and saw her branch manager, Catherine, behind her.

"Shit, you scared me, Cathy," Gabriella said with a slight laugh.

Catherine smiled. "Sorry. I was just coming out of my office from a phone hook up with Taylor McKessie from the support team. I was about to call you but realised you were still here. Can we have a quick chat?"

Gabriella's eyes widened – she felt a sinking feeling in her stomach. She felt a panicked feeling, that she'd been violating their IT policy or fraternisation policy and that she'd been instantaneously caught out.

"Um... sure..."

Catherine pulled up a chair from the desk beside Gabriella's and sat down. Gabriella sat up a little straighter, preparing for the worst.


	16. FIFTEEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

FIFTEEN

Gabriella was trying to appear calm, but evidently she wasn't succeeding in hiding her emotions.

"Gabriella, this isn't a bad conversation. I actually have some good news for you," Catherine lead in.

Gabriella breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh... I um... I was worried. There's been some office gossip... I thought maybe..."

Catherine rolled her eyes and shrugged. She wasn't immune to office gossip, but didn't care much about it either. "What you do in your time is irrelevant to me, as long as your work gets done. Now, what I wanted to talk to you about is a suggestion you made. About a month ago, I know you were proposing to your team leader some cross training suggestions – spending some time working with the support team, having the lab techs come work in our office... that sort of thing. To try to create a more rounded workplace where we all have better understanding of other departments and the challenges they face, and what we can do to work as a better team."

Gabriella nodded. She had made this suggestion, it was something she felt very strongly about and had pushed and prodded that she wanted to be a part of the program and in implementing the training.

"We're looking to implement phase 1, and we're looking to implement it as soon as possible. Phase 1 is a cross training program with our support team. What are your plans for tomorrow?"

Gabriella blinked. "Tomorrow... actually is a pretty quiet day for me. Just finished a couple of big projects..."

"Come into here 12-4," Catherine interjected. She was a straight forward woman, with a family to get home to - there was no need to use superfluous words. "Then travel to Oakland. We'll reimburse travel expenses – gas if you choose to drive, or reimburse if you want to get the Cal Train into the city and the BART across to Oakland. Then you'll spend four hours with the support team. See some of how they operate, show them our ways. And then, we'll be looking at getting some of their team in here during business hours. On Thursday, you can come into the office a couple of hours late, since you'll be home late tomorrow night. Consider it time in lieu that we owe you..." Gabriella opened her mouth, but Catherine interjected. "Don't even try to protest, you know it's true, and you know that you put in more overtime than any of your colleagues."

Gabriella paused, contemplating for about three seconds, before responding, "I'm in. Sounds awesome."

She didn't need to reveal to Catherine that her reasons for agreeing were only half professional, and that they were half personal.

Wednesday night, she would see _him_ again.

Catherine handed Gabriella a slip of folded over paper, which Gabriella opened. Listed on the paper were some scribbled directions to the Oakland office, including directions of where she could park, and a phone number for Taylor McKessie.

"Taylor has asked if you can give her a call just before you leave the office here tomorrow. I've already cleared all of this with your team leader, so don't worry about that. And finally, if you do happen to speak to anyone from the support team in the mean time, your visit is being kept as a surprise. Taylor is quite adamant that she wants you to see the team in their natural environment – they'll view you like in the same way that you would when someone important from head office is here."

Gabriella laughed. "Backs up straight, quieter, pretending to be working harder?"

Catherine nodded. "Exactly."

"I'm not on buddy so I shouldn't get any phone calls but just in case I do, noted," Gabriella said with a nod. "And I'll make sure that when the girls are doing their handover tomorrow afternoon, they don't mention anything."

"Excellent. It really is going to be a great exercise, for everyone. You can bring back the knowledge to our team here at Palo Alto as to how they operate, the things that they do right that we can implement and maybe you can help them to streamline and improve some of their processes."

"That's the hope, anyway."

"Great initiative proposing the idea, and thank you for being okay with our speed of wanting to implement – we started talking about it with the national after hours manager and after he discussed it with the shift supervisors, they were all keen to start as soon as possible – it's going to tie in really well with some performance management and training that they're running this month, hence the fast track."

"It's my pleasure, I'm genuinely looking forward to it. It's going to be a great experience."

_~Wednesday December 14, 2011 ~ _

Gabriella was excited about the prospect which Catherine had proposed, but she'd also overnight developed a series of butterflies in her tummy. The night before, despite Catherine's assurance she'd called her team leader to ensure that the message had been communicated. Having the morning to herself was a perculiar experience – she slept in, watched some morning TV, sat reading the newspaper as she ate her breakfast. Of course though, the time to herself gave her more time to contemplate how the evening would go and to develop multiple levels of nerves. She wasn't sure what to expect – if the team would welcome her, if they'd be wary of her presence. She also felt a little nervous about her lack of presence that day at work.

Gabriella's team was supportive though, when she arrived at lunchtime they expressed their excitement at the assignment she'd been given – they'd really liked her suggestion when she'd first brought it up in a team meeting, and they were looking forward to her coming back to the office with their observations. The teasing was minimal – only Tanya had the balls to ask Gabriella when she arrived wearing a cute purple silk blouse and her nicest charcoal grey pencil skirt and jacket suit, if she had dressed up ready for her visit to Oakland.

Gabriella had a lot of work to fit into a short period of time – she'd managed to refrain from logging on at home that morning however she had called through to check in, fortunately everything was under control. She did however, have time to engage in the reading and rereading and then rereading of a personal e-mail.

Sender: Troy Bolton

Time: 5:36pm

Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Hi :)

_It better not be too busy if it's literally you there running the show! _

_I'd very much so like the opportunity to spend more time with you – whether it be at training, or elsewhere._

_Kids can be cruel, I've no doubt I'd have been a laughingstock, so I'm very glad as well. Yeah, we have a pretty fun crew around here – they've agreed to my pizza plan, so you'll be pleased to know I got to eat!_

_Hope all your errands get done and you still get to enjoy your evening. When you receive this in the morning, hope you have a great day – don't work too hard!_

_-Troy _

She beamed at his e-mail, and finally decided to not reply – she'd just wait to see him that evening.

That evening. That very evening, she would be seeing Troy Bolton again.

The thought alone made her want to jump up and down, and squeal.


	17. SIXTEEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

SIXTEEN

As per the instructions given, Gabriella called Taylor just as she was leaving the office, which settled her nerves slightly – Taylor's enthusiasm was infectious.

"_Gabriella! I'm so excited you're coming. I wonder if I might be able to convince you to join my team. The overnight lab techs get paid pretty well, and I know you're more than qualified,"_ Taylor teased.

Gabriella laughed. "Tempting... on many levels."

"_I bet,"_ Taylor couldn't help but tease. _"Okay, so Catherine gave you all the directions, parking information?_

"Yup."

"_So when you get here, there's a sign for undercover parking for the building, and there's an intercom and PIN pad as you drive in. Punch in the code, come through, and you'll find right toward the front all of the _Inspire_ parking. Give me a call on my celll directly when you get here – I'll have to come down and grab you because you don't have a pass to swipe through all the doorways."_

"Got it, not a problem."

"_Seriously, girl, this is going to be both fun and effective, I think both our teams can really benefit. I'll see you when you get here!"_

She made pretty decent time, given the traffic, and arrived at about 5:20pm. She took a moment in the car to fluff up her hair, reapply her lipgloss and then to smooth down her skirt and jacket when she stepped out of her car – just a simple blue Fiesta hatch, just a few years old. She glanced around in the parking lot, almost trying to gauge which car was whose. She spotted among the mix a practical silver sedan, likely a late 2000's model; a black Mazda 3; and a small blue SUV. She took a deep breath and pulled out her work cell, dialling Taylor's call which she'd saved.

"_Good evening Inspire Solutions, Taylor speaking."_

"Hi Taylor, it's Gabriella."

"_Oh hey! Sorry, I didn't have your number saved in my cell."_

"Not a problem. Anyway I'm just in the parking lot... should I go over to the lift?"

"_Yeah, you'll be able to get to the lobby level, if you just wait there, I'll come down and meet you. Just give me two minutes."_

"Not a problem."

Gabriella discontinued the phone call, leaned over to take one final look in her side mirror, before heading over to where she could see the elevator. She followed Taylor's instructions, taking the lift to the lobby and then waiting just outside the lifts for Taylor to come down. True to her word, Taylor took only a couple of minutes, appearing in a standard corporate outfit, black pants and a white with grey pinstripe long sleeved blouse.

"Hi!" Taylor greeted, waving Gabriella over to join her in the elebator.

"You guys are in a pretty nice building here," Gabriella commented, glancing around the plush looking lobby.

"We're pretty lucky, they relocated us from our old building a few years ago, into this almost brand new building. _Inspire_ takes up a whole floor, we're up on the seventh floor."

Gabriella nodded. "Nice."

"You found us okay?"

"Yeah, no problems at all, I actually made really great time, given traffic at this time of day."

"Awesome, I'm glad. It's been a pretty hectic night so far - no problems with your accounts but it's like there's something in the water in the LA office, a bunch of firms have been calling with mad requests." Taylor rolled her eyes.

"That LA office is infamous, all Troy does is complain about them."

"I wouldn't know what to do without him, I don't think anyone else could handle them."

They arrived on the seventh floor – the general corridor split into two different entrances, and Taylor began to gesture around. "It all joins up, but that entry through there goes into the main office space, like, admin, reception, front of house. The after hours space is best accessed through this way, we have the immediate hot desk space which is through this door the other way. It's basically our space, joined amenities – kitchen, bathroom, so on – then all of the business hours consultants space, which adjoins to front of house. Make sense?"

Gabriella nodded. "Yeah. And there's no lab space here, is there? The accounts managed by the guys here are dealt with by the city office lab techs?"

"Yup. Oakland houses only some account management and consultants, a few business development types, and we also have the company payroll department here."

"Interesting."

Gabriella was kind of fascinated being led through. Taylor took her in through the front of house area first. Obviously being the same company, they had the same general office feel, the same marketing materials, company logo, even the same furniture. But in other ways, it was a whole different world. Taylor gave her a basic tour of the main office area, which was mostly dark – there was no one still at work, and it was only just 5:30pm. Gabriella was blown away, not one manager or team leader was back doing any overtime. Taylor showed her the facilities, bathroom, kitchen, vending machines, water cooler, coffee machine, and told her to make herself at home while she was there.

And then finally, they reached the main after hours area. They stood back in the doorway, just observing the room for the moment. It was a hype of activity, the phones ringing and the majority of the room on a phone call. It was a set up with a series of hot desks in an open floor plan. Even the full timers didn't have their own desks – they ran two shifts Monday – Friday and three Saturday and Sunday, so there weren't the resources nor was it practical use of space for them to have their own desk. Gabriella knew though from the general conversation she'd had with them that they tended to work with the same crew on their shifts and they had their fairly set locations that they would sit at – but the stationery was all generic, there were no photos laid out on the desks, no post it notes on the sides of screens with reminders for the next day. Gabriella glanced around, recognising Chad across one side of the room, not recognising a few people – and then her eyes finding the one person who she wanted to see most.

He was over in the back corner, by the window, facing away at his computer screen. Even from behind she recognised him. She could see that h was dressed in a blue and green striped polo shirt and tan slacks. He was leaning back in his desk chair, tossing a stress ball up and down in the air as he talked into his headset.

He suddenly frowned, putting the ball down, and began to type as he was talking.

"Gabriella?" Taylor said questioningly.

Gabriella glanced up at Taylor. "Huh?"

Taylor smirked, looking backwards and forwards between where Troy was and Gabriella's zoned out gaze.

"Did you hear me?"

"Um... sorry I was just looking around. There's so much going on here. Wow." Gabriella could hear her own voice, and could hear how lame she sounded. Taylor merely shook her head and smiled.

"We have six staff here this evening – essentially they're divided into timezones. Our staff start at staggered times, to account for east, central, mountain and west. How many consultants we have on in one night is directly correlated to the reports which you provide your team leader about your upcoming requirements – the team leaders compile this, pass onto branch managers, and then my manager has a phone hook up with all of the branch managers on a Monday morning regarding the projected requirements over the next couple of weeks. We then manage our rosters according to this – so if we have lots of branches being slammed with extra research, lots of projects, with research that requires round the clock monitoring, then we roster on more casuals."

Gabriella was already fascinated about how a quick report she did each Thursday for her manager flowed through to affect things.

"That's... kinda amazing."

Taylor laughed. "Yeah, it is pretty cool."

As Taylor had been speaking, Gabriella had been watching him out of the corner of her eye – he was still focused on his computer screen, and evidently with the buzz of noise in the room she and Taylor were out of immediate hearing range, particularly while he was on the phone himself and concentrating.

But then he pulled his headset off, placing it down onto the desk and stood from his desk to stretch momentarily. As he stretched, he turned his head around – and then did a double take as he look across the room and saw Gabriella standing there with Taylor. Gabriella gave him the smallest of waves as he recognised her, a smile breaking out onto his face.

Taylor smirked. "How about I take you around the room to say hi to the team?"

Gabriella nodded, and Taylor contemplated taking her the opposite way to the east coast guys first but then decided that it would be cruel to interfere with burgeoning love, and instead headed straight over to Troy.

"Hi you," Gabriella said shyly.

"You! What are you doing here?" he exclaimed. "Not that you're not welcome. Come hang here any night."

"Gabriella is doing some training – both training in how we do things, and also will give her the opportunity to work with us to see any ways in which we can refine our processes," Taylor explained.

"Oh, that's cool," Troy nodded, approving. "Cross training, I dig it."

"Taylor!" Chad's bellow came from across the room.

Taylor turned around irritably. Everyone knew that she and Chad were involved – the company knew, they chose to look the other way as long as the relationship wasn't present during office hours and didn't affect upon work performance. Chad liked to push the boundaries, but then again, Chad had a different way of dealing with people. It was possible that if any other supervisor was on, he'd holler out to them in an equally informal way.

"I'm busy, is it important?"

"Lab tech in New York is pissed. Wants to speak to the manager." Chad clearly sounded bored with the concept – he didn't seem to care much about one of the lab tech's being annoyed.

Taylor sighed and turned back to Troy and Gabriella. "Troy, are you busy?"

"Always, but nothing super urgent."

"Can you just take a few minutes and introduce Gabriella around the room? Person, division, offices they're dealing with tonight. The basics."

Troy nodded. "Got it."

Taylor gave Gabriella an apologetic glance before heading over to her desk to take the phone call.

"I um... I got your e-mail today," Gabriella said quietly with a smile. "Sorry I didn't reply... I knew I was coming here tonight."

"Taylor kept this such a secret!"

"I only found out last night, I'd logged off and then my branch manger grabbed me and asked if I could come. I um... I said yes, of course."

"Why would you not? Opportunity to come hang out with an awesome guy like me," Troy said with a wink. "Oh, and all these guys too."

She giggled. "But of course."

"Come on, I'll take you around."

He took her around the room, introducing her as per Taylor's specs and explaining what she was doing there. Chad made a fuss over her when Troy went over to the opposite side of the room – Taylor specified that she had to separate the guys otherwise they'd never be productive, but it was really a joke because they were the two most effective consultants on the team.

"Gabster! What the heck are you doing here?"

"Hanging out with all the cool kids," Gabriella responded with a wink.

He laughed. "Well obviously."

"Thanks for putting that call through, Chad," Taylor said, rolling her eyes, coming up behind them. "He was not that angry."

"Must be your soothing touch," Chad offered.

"Okay Troy, back to your desk to keep working – I'll take Gabriella from here," Taylor said.

Troy pouted slightly. "Don't you think I'm the most qualified trainer here? All those pesky classes in college about how to educate, you know?"

"I hear there's a difference between teaching beautiful women and bratty kids," Chad supplied. "Unless you like your women to call you sir..."

"See what I have to work with?" Taylor said to Gabriella, rolling her eyes. "It's a wonder your clients don't place complaints."

"My clients deal with Troy, not Chad – if they did I'm sure they would complain," Gabriella teased and giggled.

Troy laughed boisterously. "Shut down!"

Chad faked chest pain, clutching his heart. "Ouch"

"Troy, I just want to make sure she gets a slot in with someone from each division," Taylor pointed out. "I'll bring her back later, I promise."

"I look forward to it," he said with a wink right at Gabriella.

She felt herself flush, and despite having both Taylor and Chad within earshot, she returned with a teasing, "Likewise."


	18. SEVENTEEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

SEVENTEEN

Gabriella somehow managed to concentrate, although how she coped whilst he was just across the room was beyond her. She spent about half an hour sitting with one of the consultants dealing with each of east, central and mountain divisions, hearing about their routines, shifts, peak work times, the types of problems which they tended to encounter, the client mix. They had a buddy headset which allowed her to listen in on both sides of the conversation, but with her microphone on mute. At times she was able to offer explanation for the consultants, who obviously only had a baseline understanding of the actual research they were assisting in coordinating.

Gabriella was the kind of person who became passionately involved in her work – even if it wasn't her dream job, even if she was building her way toward what her ideal career path would be, she became involved wholly and emotionally in every step. She was a process driven person, and so it made her the ideal candidate to be taking part in their experimental branch cross over training. She was able to be objective, to overlook that some of the consultants were obviously just there because the hours suited them and the job paid reasonably well compared to other jobs they could get to pair with their college studies or other life commitments. Instead, she focused upon the processes that were in place, the procedures which they were following. She was making small notes as she worked, things to discuss with Taylor and her managers as bring back from the event.

She was timing her own evening, Taylor coming over occasionally to ask a question or check up on how things were going. Gabriella really liked Taylor – they had many similarities, they had a similar educational background and Gabriella sensed that if they were to spend more time together, they could probably become fast friends.

Just as her half hour session with Jacqui had finished, Taylor came over to chat again.

"Finished up here?" Taylor asked.

Gabriella nodded. "I could spend a whole night with each person really, but I've been taken through all the basics."

"What are your thoughts so far?" Taylor asked, as they walked to step away a little from the madness.

"I like that it's procedurally driven," Gabriella mused. "Obviously you'd deal with a bit of turnover here, need to have casuals to deal with all the peaks and troughs in our projects. As long as everyone follows a procedure then you'll wind up with similar outcomes regardless of who is handling a client."

Taylor nodded. "The process is what we have to hammer in here. Just like in a sales call centre, having their script, knowing what they need to say or request or advise to any given request. The longer someone has been here, the more that they actually _understand_ what is going on. You would've seen the difference between Jacqui and Jimmy who you dealt with – Jimmy is fairly new, he follows the script. Jacqui is like a piece of furniture around here, she works Wednesday – Sunday on the evening shift, she's rock solid, she knows the manual inside and out without having to refer to it."

Gabriella nodded. "I could see that, even if they hadn't both told me how long they'd been here."

"Jimmy's a business student at Berkeley, he's good with the phone talk, he's good at delegating things to the lab techs and at liaising with the clients. But he's not into the science. When the clients call and ask for particular elements of the data to be forwarded, he doesn't comprehend what they're actually asking for. But I don't need him to understand – he just needs to be able to pretend he understands. He's only a sophomore, so we're hoping that we'll get to keep him here for the rest of his degree."

"How much turnover do you deal with?"

"More on the early shift," Taylor admitted. "My shift is a little more settled. But there's a lot of turnover among the pure casuals, the ones who will do one or two nights and then get more work when we've got people on leave or business is ramped up."

"How do you cope with that? Constantly having someone new around?"

"I'm fortunate on my shift in that I have the experience here – most of the time, at a minimum, I have two of Jacqui, Troy and Chad. It helps having those couple of people there who you don't have to worry about. These guys are also really good at helping their colleagues – if Jimmy is getting smashed, one of the others will be there helping him out without me having to ask."

"And how does the training work?"

"On the job. Honestly, in terms of hiring, you hire with a pitch of it being high level call centre work, with an expectation for customer service skills. It depends what background they have how much training they'll do. Usually it's one or two evenings sitting listening in with one of my consultants, and then a third night where I have a consultant on the buddy head set listening in. When I can, I get Troy to do the training. Jacqui has been here longer and is great at her job but she's the type of person who just _does_ it without thinking. Troy, as a reflection of his true vocation, knows how to explain to someone how to do something, he knows how to explain things, he can deliver a high impact training session, figure out when they understand and when he's going too fast."

"Sounds like he's one of your best assets," Gabriella commented, glancing over at him.

"Truly," Taylor agreed. "_Inspire_ knows he won't be here forever, any day he might decide that he's had enough, but we'll milk all we can from him in the meantime. Anyway... speaking of Troy. I'll get you to spend the rest of the evening with him, if that's all right?"

Gabriella could've blurted out a, 'Thank you!' but instead she reeled in her excitement and responded with what she hoped was a calm, "Sure, that's fine."

Taylor lead Gabriella over to Troy. He was on a call when they hovered next to him, and he held up a finger indicating he'd just be a moment.

"Yeah, _Rawlings_ want an update first thing, the consultant will have only just walked in the door... I don't need final figures, just prelim results. If you get the data across to us we can do up the basic report... Uh-huh... okay sweet, give me an update. See ya Joe."

Troy looked up at Gabriella and Taylor. "What can I do for you lovely ladies?"

"Go on your first break," Taylor instructed, glancing at her watch. "And then when you're back. I'll have her with you for the rest of her time here – another hour or so, I think it'll be. I'd like you to go over how we conduct training with new starters, and also just generally how you deal with the clients."

Troy nodded. "Got it."

Taylor looked at Gabriella. "You can take a break if you want, or log into a spare computer and do whatever you like."

"I wouldn't mind grabbing some food..." she said tentatively, glancing at Troy.

"I'm gonna head across the road to the grocery store, come with me," he urged.

Gabriella contemplated, and then nodded tentatively, agreeing. "Sure, sounds great."

Troy took a couple of minutes just to give the run down on what he was working on with one of his colleagues, just in case in the next fifteen minutes he had someone call back for him. Gabriella retrieved her coat from where she'd left it on a coat hook by the entry into the support team space, and decided upon leaving her folder with notes by Troy's desk.

"So, how are you finding it?" he asked her conversationally as they headed out into the hallway to grab the elevator down.

"Interesting, really interesting. I don't think just one night is going to give me the full picture, but it's an awesome start."

"That'll have to be a part of your feedback, that you need to come back again."

She smiled. "Hopefully."

The elevator opened in the hallway and they stepped inside, Troy leaning across Gabriella to press the button for the lobby level.

"The store is like, a two minute walk away," he explained to her. "They have like a deli section with sandwiches and things, plus you can get snack foods and fruit and stuff. Frozen dinners as well."

"How long will this break be?"

"Hrm, Taylor isn't super strict as long as we have coverage. In theory its like a quick break. I usually grab food on my first break, my short break, and then eat dinner at my desk, and when I take my proper half hour break a bit later, normally around 9pm, I tend to zone out, watch the TV in the lunch room or something. If I eat too late then I struggle to sleep when I get home."

Gabriella nodded. "Fair enough, that makes sense."

The elevator opened as they reached the lobby, Troy gesturing for her to lead. She kept in step with him as they headed out the main entrance onto the street.

"So where abouts do you live?" she asked him. "Around here?"

"Cherryland, actually. Near Hayward?"

"I know it. Just across the bridge from me," she said, sounding pleased. "I live in Foster City."

"We probably live closer to each other than we do to our _Inspire_ offices," Troy observed. "I live just five minutes from the school I teach at, though."

"That's convenient."

"Yeah it's good, since I get minimal sleep. I roll out of bed, get the coffee machine going, have a quick shower, pour the coffee into my travel mug and scoff down a granola bar and a piece of fruit in the car."

Gabriella tutted disapprovingly. "I can't help but worry about you, Troy."

"Worry about me? That would imply that you care about my well-being."

"Of course I care about your well-being."

"Do you care more about my well-being than you do an average co-worker?" he prodded with a raised eyebrow.

Gabriella hesitated. It was one of those moments in their interactions when she knew that he was prodding at her, when he was giving her an opening. She was guarded though, she wasn't the kind of who liked to put herself out there on a limb, open her heart to be broken. So she was careful in her response.

"Well... we don't know each other extremely well, but I'd like to think that we get along rather well... that we go beyond just the business and have a general friendly chat." They had reached the supermarket, and he paused outside, looking at her. She looked back at him. "What?"

He sighed and smiled. "Nothing. Come on, let's go in."

The next five minutes involved a quick browse through the market. Troy had his regular things he would buy, he headed straight for the bakery to grab some bread rolls and to the deli to get some sliced turkey. Gabriella opted for a pre-made fruit salad and a small tub of yoghurt. He grabbed a chilled bottle of Coke, she took a small juice, and they were through the checkouts and heading back to _Inspire._ He told her she should sit in the kitchen and eat her food if she wanted to; but when he told her that he was going to eat at his desk, she elected to just bring hers to his desk too. He paused in the lunch room long enough to make up his bread rolls, spreading them with mayonnaise he had in the fridge and adding the lunch meat.

They returned to his desk. Troy quickly gave her a run down of his personal routine – going through the branches he looked after. Depending on how busy they were and how many consultants were on, he would look after up to seven offices.

"_Inspire_, as you'd know, started here in the Bay, most cities don't have three offices, but we have a huge market share in this area. Hence that we have Palo Alto, Oakland and San Francisco City. Then I do Los Angeles; and if things are a bit quieter, I might also do Portland, Seattle and Carson City, but usually those three cities are shared between me and another consultant."

Gabriella was surprised – she'd never even heard him talk about any of the other offices, just the California based ones.

He gave her a run down on the basic training material that he'd go through with a new starter, and then moved onto hooking up the buddy headset as he worked on his clients.

Gabriella was fascinated watching him interact with her offices - he had built his own rapport, something which she'd never imagined. People always talked about their support team just being a phone service, taking messages, dealing with only the urgent. Troy seemed to genuinely care about all of the clients he dealt with, even the painful ones which he dealt with through the Los Angeles branch.

"You're looking at me strangely... do I have something on my face?" Troy asked, wiping at his perfect mouth.

Gabriella laughed and shook her head. "No I'm uh... I'm actually very impressed. If you ever decide that your future doesn't lie in teaching, come get a full time job through our Palo Alto branch. I dare say you'd be a far better consultant than I."

Troy shook his head. "Nah, this kills me. I think eighteen months at most will be my stay here, I couldn't handle it a minute longer!"

"Yeah, but you only deal with the bad, with the crazy ringing phones and demanding supervisors. You have a knack for handling them which shows me you'd be good at the stuff I'm not good at - going out to development meetings, negotiating with them, that kind of thing."

Troy shrugged. "I just... be me."

"It must be your natural, charming, effervescent self then," Gabriella teased.

He smiled and winked. "But of course. I just charm them all into thinking that I'm doing a good job."

"Is teaching your true passion though?"

Troy paused thoughtfully. "I think so. I know I'm not going to get rich from it. There's this part of me that sort of wonders where I can go, career wise. Like, I'm not interested really in becoming a principal or anything like that. I could go the route of teaching for a while and then doing post grad studies and maybe lecturing or something. But I do really like kids, I like inspiring them to want to learn and be in school. I had friends who didn't get to have that experience of connecting with a teacher and it affects your education, you know?"

Gabriella nodded. "I get that."

"Plus I love being involved in sport in schools - so many of the kids hate taking PE but I love when I can make them not completely hate it."

"I always hated PE," Gabriella admitted. "Though maybe if I'd had a hot teacher like you it would've helped!"

"You think I'm hot?" he asked, cocking his head and smiling.

She blushed furiously, opened her mouth, closed it, opened it again, and managed to stammer, "Um, well..."

He laughed. "Just kidding. You already admitted that at the Christmas party, after all," he said with a wink. "I did have a problem with a girl having a crush on me last year..."

Gabriella couldn't help but aww, although she appreciated that for him, it was a dangerous area, possibly the most problematic for any male teacher in the current climate. "That's so cute! How old was she?"

"Twelve. It's dangerous though - being a male teacher, having to deal with girls. Especially being a PE teacher. It's easy to look the wrong way and next thing you know, gossip is flying around. I don't know if I could handle high school, middle school is okay - the kids are old enough to have a conversation with, but young enough that they aren't total brats."

"My memory of thirteen year old boys involves them being pretty bratty."

"They like my classes," Troy chuckled.

"Don't teachers have to do a lot of work outside of school hours? How on earth do you actually manage it all? It's not like you walk out the gates at 3pm and cruise your way to this job starting at 5pm."

"It's hard," Troy admitted. "I have to be really organised with my lesson planning. Normally I do a months lessons plans at a time. I'll sit down on the weekend once a month and nut it all out. If it's a quieter night here, which happens sometimes, I get to do some marking. I have to be really structured with my class time - some of my colleagues will like, when the kids are reading a chapter or working on a problem, they'll just fluff around, read a magazine, check their cell phone. For me, every minute counts, you know? That might be one more paper I can grade."

"Is it worth it?"

"I can tell you that my loans aren't as scary as other people I know," Troy pointed out. "I think the hardest thing isn't that I have to work hard - it's that I have no time for a social life."

"Do you... like... do you have time to date?"

Troy was about to respond, when his phone began ringing with an internal call that was being placed through. "Yo... yeah okay, put them through."

Gabriella was disappointed at not being able to hear his response.

The rest of the evening flew, and before Gabriella knew it, Taylor had come over to point out the time.

"Sorry to interrupt all of the... teaching... but it's 9:45pm," Taylor pointed out. "I suspect it might be time for you to go home, and you Troy should take your proper break."

"Crap... is that the time?" Gabriella was shocked, it felt like she'd been sitting with Troy for no more than a n hour, not two and a half hours.

"I just have to finish this e-mail then I'll go on break," Troy said.

"Um, I guess I'll go around and say goodbye to everyone."

Troy glanced up – she had walked away from his desk but left her purse and jacket on the chair beside him, so he could assume that she was heading back over. He typed away furiously, firing away the e-mail and then quickly updating a colleague on what was going on, finishing his explanation just as Gabriella stepped back over to his desk.

"Um..." she opened.

"Hey, I'll walk you down to your car. Make sure you get there safely," he offered.

She nodded, shyly agreeing, and then turned to Taylor.

"Thanks so much for the experience here tonight, it was so truly rewarding," she said. "I'd love to come back if you'll have me."

"Any time – just make sure it's a night I'm here! Hopefully next time, now that you've had an overview from the consultants level, I can talk to you a bit more about my role and how we manage things."

Gabriella nodded. "Sounds wonderful."

With a final farewell to the office, Gabriella collected her things and then led the way out to the corridor, Troy following behind her. The elevator was already on their floor, the doors opening immediately after he pressed the down button.

"Troy I... thanks so much. You've been so accommodating, I've really enjoyed my time here, mostly thank to you."

"It's been a pleasure having you here, seriously," he said, and then added with a wink. "I can only hope that I've managed to live up to your work related expectations."

She laughed. "You exceed them in every way."

The rest of the short elevator ride was silent, until they reached the first level of the parking garage. Troy trailed after Gabriella as she headed over to her car, unlocking it with the remote and setting her things inside on the front passenger seat before turning back to him.

Troy began to speak, staring at the concrete floor. "Before, you asked me a question that I didn't get to answer and I really want to answer it, if you don't mind... because I think it's important that you know the answer."

"Um... okay?"

"You asked if I have time to date. My answer is that despite male stereotype, I'm good with multitasking and time management. My answer is that for the right person... I make time."

Gabriella blinked. She wasn't good at reading signals. She was the kind of girl who had, in the past, interpreted innocent things to be more than innocent and been proven wrong, and so she'd developed a tendency to shrug off signals.

"For the right person?"

"Yes. Someone who I... have chemistry with."

And it was back to chemistry – all about chemistry.

"Whoever that person is... she's a very lucky woman," Gabriella found herself saying softly, and then squeezing him on the arm and leaning over to kiss him on the cheek. "Thank you again, and good night."

And Gabriella turned, stepped into her car, and left Troy standing there, watching after her as she left.

Again.


	19. EIGHTEEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

EIGHTEEN

_~ Thursday December 15 2011 ~_

She'd blown him off.

The whole drive home, Gabriella wanted to turn back time and figure out some other way to respond to Troy – she knew, in her heart, that he was trying to tell her that he was interested, that he was fishing to figure out if she was interested too. Instead of dropping him the hint, instead of giving him that go ahead that if he made a real move that she'd respond positively – she'd blown him off.

It was a long, exhausting drive home, and all she could do upon returning to her apartment was collapse into bed – she was exhausted, but she couldn't sleep, having a fitful night, tossing and turning.

It was kharma.

She went into work at 11am the next day as per the agreement she'd made with her team leader the day before, and prior to even having the chance to sit down and log in, she was inundated with queries from her officemates – they were curious to know everything from whether the Oakland office had better furniture to whether they were really as incompetent as they sometimes seemed. Gabriella's feedback was on the whole positive – there were areas for improvement but on the whole, it had been an eye opening experience.

Finally she was able to sit down and log in, answering a couple more questions as her computer loaded, and then turning to look at her e-mail account.

Sender: Troy Bolton

Time: Yesterday, 10:45pm

_Thank you for gracing us with your presence tonight. I enjoyed every moment I spent in your company – if only each moment could've been twice as long and I couldn't spent twice as much time with you. _

The signs which she had been brushing off were becoming more and more obvious. He was succeeding in making her feel like even more of a jerk for the way she'd ignored his advances.

Gabriella volunteered to do handover that afternoon, citing that she wanted to speak to them and follow up on some things she'd learnt the night before. Kelsi and Martha were more than happy to get out of the office. She waited a little while, continuing to work on her report she was compiling with her findings from the experiment, and waiting until 5:30pm to call through. Jacqui answered the phone – Gabriella was able to say hi, how are you, in a genuine way, actually feeling as though she had a sincere care factor for how Jacqui's day had been. She was transferred through to Troy, who picked up the call straight away.

"_Hey you,"_ he greeted her, his former professional manner dropped.

"Hi to you as well."

"_Hope you recovered after your late night."_

"Since they had me come in late this morning, I handled it just fine."

"_That's great they let you do that."_

Gabriella cleared her throat. "Um so... handover."

They went through the formality quickly and then the line went quiet. Neither one of them wanted to discontinue the phone call, to break the connection.

"_Did you get my e-mail?"_

"Um yeah... I did. Sorry I didn't respond I've uh... been busy doing my report and other things. I need to send e-mails through to everyone, you know... thanking them for the experience. For the fun and the good time I had..."

"_Of course. You need to send that through to everyone."_

Gabriella cleared her throat. "Everyone was very... hospitable."

"_Glad we could make you feel welcome."_

"Anyway... guess I should let you go. I uh... have a good weekend."

"_You as well, good night."_

She could hear the confusion in his tone – she wanted to pick up the phone and call him back, apologise for being cold, for being a bitch. For a moment she contemplated picking up the phone and calling him, but instead, she found herself turning back to her computer and her report.

Until five minutes later, when her work cell began to ring.

She didn't recognise the number, it was another cell phone number, and she almost let it go through to voicemail but at last minute, picked up the call.

"Thank you for calling _Inspire Solutions_, this is Gabriella, how may I help you?"

"_Gabriella... I'm trying really hard here to not get hurt but you're starting to make me think that maybe I'm just imagining things."_

"Sorry... what?" she blinked. "Troy, is that you?"

"_Yeah. It's me. You know, you and I have known each other in a professional capacity for a while now. It was fun and it was borderline flirty but it was nothing serious. But Friday night; that was real. You can't tell me that it wasn't just me. I felt something there. And last night... shit, I know it was mostly professional again but fuck, Gabriella, you're driving me crazy. And I thought that I was being kind of obvious but then again, maybe I wasn't. And I know that it's hard to believe given my workaholic ways but I'm actually kind of a 'live for the moment' kind of person and so, in the spirit of that: Gabriella, I think you're stunning, funny, intelligent, witty, sexy and just completely amazing."_

The phone line was quiet for a moment, and then Gabriella finally found her voice. "Anything else?"

_"Do I need more? Do I need to sell myself to you? Convince you that I'm worth your time, that despite my workaholic ways I will make myself available to you every weekend, if we go on one date and it leads to two and three and more. I'll make myself available to you during any break time I have. I have an awesome phone plan and a fuel efficient car."_

"How resourceful of you."

_"Don't write this off as being impossible before giving it a go. I get the feeling that... that maybe something happened to you. Some guy did the wrong thing by you. And you're the kind who uses excuses to guard your heart."_

She'd only officially known this man for a week and yet somehow, he'd managed to figure her out completely. It bewildered her, that she hadn't meant to let him in, and yet it was like he knew her very soul. She was surprised at his intuition, and yet touched that he'd taken the time to pay enough attention to her.

_"I know that I work a lot. I know that it is one of those things that is immediately off putting - that you can't help but feel like it will get in the way, so why even try."_

She couldn't speak - it was like he lived inside her mind.

_"But Gabriella. there's something here. Fuck, it scares me how I'm feeling after such a short time. I can feel... sparks. And I know it's not just me. Is it?"_

Finally, he'd directly asked her the question, put the ball in her court.

"It's not just you. I feel it too... it scares me... but I feel it." Her voice was small – but honest. "There's this part of me that wants to write it off, wants to run away because it seems so hard. But... there's this bigger part of me which... which just can't stay away from you."

_"That works nicely, because I don't want to stay away from you, either."_

"I feel scared. This is... it's scary how I'm feeling, so fast. We've... we've met twice!"

_"Not scary. Don't be scared. It's... it's a good thing. Chemistry is good. We need to just... start somewhere simple."_

"Simple?" she echoed cocking her head. "Nothing about this seems simple."

_"We need to start with a date. And so, I go back to the question I perhaps should've just asked instead of rambling on with all this word vomit... will you go out with me?"_


	20. NINETEEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

NINETEEN

Troy was sitting at his desk at _Inspire_ – well, it wasn't technically _his_ desk but five nights of the week it was. He had been hit by a sudden wind of living for the moment, you only live once type of mentality. He was crazy about her and he was pretty sure that she was crazy about him – so to hell with it. Without even thinking, he pulled up their contact list, punched her number into his cell phone and as it began to ring, made his way out of the office and into the hallway in front of the elevator, away from listening ears.

As he'd rambled and bared his soul, he'd been pacing backwards and forwards, divulging every inch of how he was feeling and what he was speculating was making her run hot and cold.

"But Gabriella. there's something here. Fuck, it scares me how I'm feeling after such a short time. I can feel... sparks. And I know it's not just me. Is it?"

The next few moments were the longest few moments of his life. The fact that she hadn't already stopped him from his rant instilled the tiniest bit of confidence in him that she felt the same – it would be cruel to let him bare his soul and only then let him down.

_"It's not just you. I feel it too... it scares me... but I feel it." _

He knew it. He could've fist pumped, jumped up and down, squealed with glee. He'd been certain that it wasn't just him. He wasn't clueless to the signals, he knew what the looks that a woman gave him were, he knew that there was something about the way she would laugh and smile and look at him that wasn't the way you'd look at a newfound platonic only friendship. But there'd been a part of him that wondered if maybe he'd just imagined it all, convinced himself of the signals, because he was so crazy about her that the idea that she didn't feel the same way was so frightening that a delusion was better to deal with.

_"There's this part of me that wants to write it off, wants to run away because it seems so hard. But... there's this bigger part of me which... which just can't stay away from you."_

"That works nicely, because I don't want to stay away from you, either."

_"I feel scared. This is... it's scary how I'm feeling, so fast. We've... we've met twice!"_

He shook his head. "Not scary. Don't be scared," he coaxed. "It's... it's a good thing. Chemistry is good. We need to just... start somewhere simple."

_"Simple? Nothing about this seems simple."_

"We need to start with a date. And so, I go back to the question I perhaps should've just asked instead of rambling on with all this word vomit... will you go out with me?"

_"A date?"_

"Yes, a good old fashioned date, I hear that decent gentlemen take the women they wish to court out for an evening of fun, pay for a meal, and maybe a movie or some other form of entertainment."

_"Me and you, on a date?"_

"Yes. Tomorrow night."

_"Will this be after your afternoon nap?"_ she giggled.

He smirked – he knew her well. "Probably, and maybe an energy drink or two. Will I be needing a whole six pack worth of energy drinks to fuel enough stamina to get through an evening with you, Miss Montez?"

She flushed, but smiled cheekily. _"Hrm, some stamina required, but on the first date you may just be able to get through with just an energy drink or two."_

He smiled. "Duly noted."

_"This Friday?"_

"This Friday. That is... if you're available. And you want to."

"_My answer... is yes."_

"Troy! What are you doing? The phones are going insane in here!" Taylor's irritated voice snapped from the doorway.

He winced. "Sorry, family emergency... I'll be done in a minute." Taylor rolled her eyes and turned away. "Did you hear that?"

"_I did. Um... where are you?"_

"In the hallway. Listen... can I call you back a little later?"

"_Yes. You can... is this your number you're calling from, your personal number?"_

"Yeah."

"_I'll text you so you have my number. My personal number."_

"I look forward to it. If you don't, I'll just have to stalk you on this number. You're not getting rid of me now."

She laughed again. _"I promise."_

"Talk to you later."

"_And I look forward to that."_

He disconnected the call, grinning madly at his cell phone. The distant sound of the phones ringing could be heard, even through the glass, and he winced again and darted back into the office. Taylor gave him a dirty look as he rushed past her at her desk. Five minutes later, as he was on the phone with an annoyed lab tech trying to organise some results to be forwarded as soon as possible, his cell phone vibrated on the desk. He couldn't wait, picking up his phone as the tech was speaking and looking at the screen.

_Thank you for having the courage to do what I was afraid of. Call me when you can. -Gabriella_

Nothing was going to put a dampener on his mood.

She liked him too.

She said yes.

Life was good.


	21. TWENTY

_**SERENDIPITY**_

TWENTY

Troy was such a packet of surprises, so many contradictions, something which Gabriella already had learnt but which their first date proved without a doubt. He surprised her immediately upon the start of the date, at the moment that he pulled up outside of her house. He buzzed to be let up, she responded to the intercom and gave him directions to come up to the third floor and then she was the second apartment on the right from the elevator. When she opened the door, he was leaning against the wall, a small but elegant bouquet of daisies in hand. His flower choice strangely was delightful to her - he hadn't gotten some giant bouquet of hideous carnations or gone over the top with roses - and it was such a traditional gesture. He'd proved to possess many traditional traits, something which appealed to the romantic in her.

"Hi," she greeted him with a smile.

"Nice place," he remarked with a grin, and presented her with the flowers. "These are for you."

"Thank you," she said sweetly, accepting the flowers and taking in a deep breath. "They're lovely."

"Lovely flowers for the lovely lady," he joked.

"Come in, I'll pop these into a vase quickly."

She invited him in and waved toward the living area where he could wait, but instead he followed her straight into the kitchen where she grabbed a vase and filled it with water, placing the flowers neatly inside. She would arrange them later, and she left them on the bench.

"You look gorgeous," he said approvingly, glancing down at the fit of her black dress. It was long sleeved with a boat neckline, the fabric clinging to her frame and highlighting her slender figure. The pencil skirt fell just above her knees.

"As do you," she blushed. He scrubbed up very nicely, he'd donned a pair of nice jeans, a button down shirt and a sports coat for the occasion.

She gathered her coat and purse and led the way back to her front door. She'd just locked it behind her when he grabbed her arm and held her close. "I um... I decided that I _could_ be a gentlemen and wait until the end of the date, but I think that you and I have been dancing around this for long enough now and so I'm gonna do this now. Unless... you have any objections. If you do, I suggest you tell me right now," he said softly.

She swallowed as he hovered close to her, his breath tickling against her skin. She knew what was coming, and she was waiting with eager anticipation.

"No objections," she managed to say.

It was all the invitation that Troy required, and he sweetly, softly, pressed his lips against hers, lingering momentarily, taking in her scent and her touch and her feel, before pulling away, caressing her cheek lightly.

"Ready to go?" he asked.

She drew in a deep breath. "If I didn't know otherwise, I'd think you were trying to break my first date ethical morals," she teased.

He grinned. "I would never let you do that. I think you and I have proved that the anticipation makes it all the more worthwhile."

He led her down to where he'd parked in the small visitors parking lot - and then she was immediately assaulted by his latest surprise. When she'd been standing in the Oakland _Inspire_ office looking around at the cars, her money had been on either the SUV or the Mazda 3 to be Troy's. Instead, she was greeted by a practical silver Hyundai sedan, probably four or five years old, she suspected bought second hand. The gentleman that he was, he opened the door for her to allow her to step into the vehicle before closing the door and going around to his door. The engine roared into life and the CD began to play - the soft sounds of Dave Matthews playing through the speakers.

"This is very... comfortable," she said, carefully, glancing around at his car.

He smirked. "Comfortable? Is that the word you've got for me?"

She smiled. "I don't know what I expected you to drive. Maybe a Mazda or something? I don't know."

"Maybe I am my mother's son," Troy said with a laugh. "Or maybe it's because my first car was this pick up truck that was so _not_ fuel efficient, it guzzled fuel down like it was a dehydrated person in the middle of the Sahara presented with a fountain of water."

She smiled - he had a really interesting way of illustrating his points, he was very visual, painting abstract pictures with his descriptions, and it amused her.

"So... where are we going?"

"I made a reservation nearby – I thought about going somewhere in the city but at this time of year, parking will be bedlam and..."

"Say no more," Gabriella interrupted. "Local is fine."

"Awesome. Well I got a reservation at this restaurant I've been to a couple of times in San Mateo. They have an awesome menu, amazing wine selection, and there's this lounge area where you can go to after dinner to have drinks and chat."

Gabriella smiled. "Sounds perfect."

It was less than a twenty minute journey, door to door, allowing time to park and head up the street. Troy proved to be the perfect gentleman, helping her put her coat on, helping her shrug it off when they were inside the shelter of the restaurant. Holding the car door open, holding the restaurant door open. He almost had what she viewed as being proper southern manners, although he wasn't from the American South – perhaps being from a state neighbouring to Texas had rubbed off on his upbringing. The reservation he'd made had been very necessary, being a week before Christmas there were lots of people out and about, small groups of people out for Christmas celebrations. They were able to be seated at their table after just a few minutes of waiting at the bar, just enough time for Troy to buy a drink for each of them at the bar. The hostess led them over to their table. Troy helped tuck Gabriella into her seat and gave her some feedback on a few things he'd had from the menu before. The first few minutes at the table were casual chit chat back and forth about the menu, likes and dislikes in food, other restaurant experiences they'd both had.

"Get out! There's no way that you can love fondue more than me," Troy declared.

"Oh, I don't know, I love fondue a _lot_ so I think it might be a tight battle."

"Have you been to The Melting Pot before?"

"I _love_ that place! But no one ever wants..."

"... to come with you?" Troy finished.

Gabriella grinned "Maybe we can go there next time."

"Next time?" Troy questioned.

She ducked her head. "You know... maybe... we'll see."

He grinned – he could've given her a harder time but instead decided to let it go.

The server came over soon after to take their orders, and then they resumed conversation. Gabriella had already known that she and Troy got along well, that they were able to talk easily, but she had felt a little worried that maybe when taken out of the work context that they'd run short of conversation. However her worries were entirely unnecessary, and the evening was only proving to her that Troy was exactly the kind of person she liked to surround herself with.

They talked a little about work, about plans for the future, about their college experiences. They gossiped about their work colleagues. They shared backgrounds, stories about their families and childhoods.

Troy was light and playful and fun and free-spirited, but then he'd pause and say something thoughtful and insightful that would make her blink in surprise. If she'd seen him at the mall, she'd assume he was one of those cool guys who just knows that he's cool, he tended to walk with a swagger and a wink that just told her that he knew that he was hot. But he was so much more than being attractive and charming, he was proving himself to have a whole package of admirable and attractive qualities.

The food came and conversation became a bit quieter, but in a comfortable way. When they finished, Troy coaxed her into agreeing to order a dessert. They settled upon a slice of the mango cheesecake to share. Whilst waiting for the dessert to be brought out, Troy told a story about catching Taylor and Chad kissing in the bathroom at work.

"Taylor was absolutely mortified, but as I pointed out to her, at least it was only me that had to see it!"

Gabriella laughed – but Troy's mention of Taylor and Chad led her mind to something which she'd been curious about, and decided that it was as good a time as any to inquire.

"Hey um... have you told anyone at work about... about whatever this has been?" she asked, gesturing back and forth between them.

He smiled. "About the flirtatious e-mails and my most embarrassing invitation for a date ever?"

She giggled, but confirmed, "Yes."

"No. I haven't," Troy spoke honestly. "Not even Chad, who is one of my closest buddies outside of work. They... they knew that I was kind of interested in meeting you before the Christmas party, it was like this office joke. And they knew that I thought you were hot when we met. But I haven't indicated that we're anything but friends. I think they get the impression that we like each other and are dancing around it, but don't realise just how close we're dancing around it... does that make sense?"

She nodded. "Pretty much exactly the same on my end. And... if you don't mind... I'd really like to keep it that way. If you trust Chad, then I don't mind you mentioning it to him, but I just... I don't feel comfortable being office gossip, it isn't my style."

"I can appreciate that. It isn't as much of an issue for me but I get that for you, it's a big deal."

"Thank you. I appreciate that you appreciate it. I just... you know if we... if we go out again or... if this becomes... I'm not saying it'll be like, a secret forever. You know?"

He smiled and reached over, enclosing her hand over hers and squeezing gently. "I understand. To be honest... I don't want to share you yet, anyway. I like that this is about just us. I don't know what Palo Alto is like but at Oakland, people think that what is my business is their business."

"Maybe all offices are the same, it's exactly like that at Palo Alto, it's ridiculous," Gabriella commented with a roll of the eyes.

The server came over, bringing over an ample slice of cheesecake with two spoons, setting it down in between the two of them. Gabriella's little moans and sighs of pleasure as she took each mouthful of cheesecake was so enticingly arousing that he made sure that she ate more than her fair half of the dessert, just to hear more of the sounds escaping her lips.

"Would it be terribly cliché of me to tell you that you have a tiny bit of mango sauce here," Troy asked teasingly, gesturing to his lip. "And offering to clean it up for you?"

She smiled back, biting her lower lip. "It would be cliché, but a welcome cliché."

"Good. Then you have cheesecake all over your lips."

He leaned over, pressing his lips against hers softly, allowing them to linger for a moment before pulling away.

"You don't need cliché opportunities for that," she informed him, smiling shyly.

"I have open invitation to kiss you when I want? On the first date? I must be doing well then."

"Ticks in all the boxes so far."

After finishing dessert they opted to move into the lounge area of the restaurant, taking over a small love seat in the corner as they each agreed on having just one more drink – Troy was driving, after all. They made that drink last a long time, chatting, laughing, flirting. They were sitting close together, legs pressed together, taking any opportunity to touch the other ones arm in the midst of conversation. He stole one more kiss from her as they finished the final sips of their drinks and begrudgingly made the decision that it was perhaps time to make a move.

Troy delivered Gabriella right back to the front door of her apartment, parking in the visitors parking spots and insisting upon walking her upstairs. She didn't question it - she wasn't looking forward to saying good night. She wished there was some scenic route they could take, maybe press the buttons of every floor of the building or take the stairs, anything to prolong their time together. She was so busy thinking about wanting more time with him that she didn't realise she had been silent for the whole elevator ride and next thing she knew, she was standing in front of her apartment as he stood looking expectantly at her.

She felt so grateful to him for breaking the ice with their first kiss, and second kiss, and third kiss - because it gave her the confidence to grab him by his jacket, pull him toward her, and initiate their fourth kiss. It started as simple and soft, but she led the way into a far more passionate kiss. Her hands at first held his his biceps, even under his jacket feeling the bulging muscles. A hand strayed and found its way onto his shoulder blade, so strong and warm to her touch. He was being as gentlemanly as possible, with one hand holding her head, threading slightly through her curls, but the other hand which was on the small of her back dipped down slightly, and lightly squeezed on the very top of her right butt cheek. She moaned slightly into the kiss and forced herself to pull away.

"Troy... shit... you're back to making me want to invite you in," Gabriella murmured, her face still just inches from his.

His lips pressed sweet kisses along her jawline. He smiled, pressing a soft kiss to her lips which deepened, and then he pulled away, their foreheads resting together.

"And as much as I appreciate the gesture that you want to invite me in... I would be a gentlemen and insist that we go our separate ways instead. Not that I don't want to."

"Hey um... what are you doing tomorrow?" she murmured.

He smiled. "Spending the day with you, I hope?"

She bit her lower lip and nodded slightly. "I know I should play hard to get like a typical girl and tell you I'm not sure and make you follow up tomorrow to see if I have free time but... I have absolutely no plans and that sounds awesome."

"Gabriella, you're not a typical girl, which is a part of what I find utterly adorable about you. Don't ever try to be like anyone but yourself," he said, partly teasingly but with a note of seriousness.

She blushed, not sure what to say to his statement, so instead she turned back to spending the day together. "Um... what do you want to do tomorrow?"

Troy already had a couple of ideas in mind, but he didn't want to reveal them until he'd finalised the plans. "I'm not sure yet. Can we start with brunch and go from there? I need to check a few things first," he mused. "I'll pick you up at 10am, if that's not too early?"

It was just shy of midnight, and Gabriella contemplated this - it would mean only a brief period of time to herself surrounding the time she'd spend sleeping.

"Not too early at all. If anything it seems too far away."

Troy laughed. "Gotta let me get home and get my beauty sleep and get back. I've had a long work week, remember?"

Suddenly she felt guilty. "You can make it later, if you want?"

He shushed her, pressing a finger to her lips. "10am on the dot, no later. Now I'm leaving before I barge through your door and continue to ravish you."

_Ravish me, _she thought.

"10am, on the dot," she echoed. "What do I wear?"

"Hrm, casual. Comfortable shoes - no hiking boots, but allow for a bit of walking. And we may be outside a little? I'll see what the weather forecast is before I finalise things."

"I don't usually like surprises but I feel like everything with you is one big surprise and I kind of love it," she confessed, pressing one final kiss to his lips. "Go. Drive safely, and can you text me when you get home so I know you're okay?"

He chuckled. "It's a 20 minute drive, I'm sure I'll be fine. But I'll text you anyway."

He squeezed her hand and began to walk away to head toward the elevator, fingers remaining entwined until the moment he was too far away to remain the connection. She watched after him, murmuring a quiet good bye as he stepped onto the elevator, and waiting until the doors had closed.

She headed into her apartment, going about her nightly routine of getting changed into pyjamas and face washing and brushing her teeth in a daze.

Gabriella couldn't comprehend the sensations she was experiencing. A smile was plastered across her face, etched, unable to be removed. She felt butterflies in her stomach and heart and fingertips. Her skin was hot, she felt aroused as a result of their passionate kisses and overcome with successful first date giddiness. She'd been on first dates before, nice first dates where she'd left hoping that he would call and they'd see each other again - most times, he had called. But never before had she experienced a date like the one she'd just been on, a date with a man who had succeeded in stimulating and touching every inch of her being by being in his presence for an extended period of time.

She'd just settled into bed when her phone bleeped with a text.

_'Home safe. See you in 9 hours and 35 minutes. xo.'_


	22. TWENTYONE

_**SERENDIPITY**_

TWENTY-ONE

_~ Monday 19 December 2011 ~ _

**I'm gonna be lame and say it. I just had the most fucking amazing weekend and I miss you sfm. It's okay 10am, the kids are all rowdy as hell – only four more days of this for this year!**

_Lameness appreciated. I feel exactly the same way. Naughty Mr. Bolton, texting in class? Not a very good role model, are you?_

**I'm not in class. I have a free period. I'm actually marking at the moment. Although I suppose I'm being naughty because I'm blowing off my marking to text you instead.**

_Kelsi just asked me who I was texting and why I was smiling. I told her that my mum had said something funny…_

**You're the naughty one, texting at work where everyone can see you.**

_I like that I have someone to text now. Everyone else is always taking personal calls and texting at work, I say it is time that I get to do that!_

**Just try to stop me. I might have to wait to see you next, but at least we can keep in touch like this.**

_Sounds like a good plan for me. So, Mr. Bolton, what lesson is next?_

**6th grade PE. We're doing basketball, which of course, I love.**

_Of course you would. I'd love to see you play some day, obviously you still really love it._

**I don't get much time to play it recreationally, people say I should join a social league or something... maybe one day.**

_Sure you have time, you can dash out for a game during your break at Inspire can't you?_

**Haha, funny. So, what's going on today?**

_It's pretty quiet, my TL has us focusing on just getting all the files tidies, cases closed, ready for the break._

**So it's really gonna be just you and a lab tech?**

_And a temp admin girl just four hours each day. _

**Sucks.**

_I don't mind, really. Plus I get to save up my leave. _

**Do you know when you'll next take some vacation time?**

_I'm not sure... I just prefer to save it so I know I'll have leave days when I need them, if there's a special event or something._

**Yeah, I get that. I was serious when I said I'd help you out if you need it though, I still think it kind of sucks that they're relying on you to run the whole show.**

_I'm over it. Besides, now I have a texting buddy while I'm at work... ;)_

**Glad I can oblige, even temporarily. About to head to class now though... any tips on how to get a thirteen year old girl to embrace basketball?**

_Um, bribe her with Justin Bieber merchandise every time she scores a basket?_

**Nice one. Not sure if the school endorses bribery though. Text you later x**

_Have fun and good luck xx_

Gabriella felt giddy all day at work. Four times, she had a colleague ask her _why_ she was smiling or the reason for her cheeriness. Every time, she shrugged it off, citing that she was simply in a 'good mood.' She was in a good mood, it wasn't a lie, it just didn't specify the root cause for the good mood. Her weekend with Troy had been utterly amazing on every level and if any part of her hadn't been sure that they had a spark worth pursuing after their date of Friday, she'd been completely convinced after spending the next two days with him as well.

On Saturday, after going for brunch, they'd taken the train into San Francisco proper and spent almost the whole day at the Exploratorium, which Troy had been shocked to hear Gabriella hadn't visited. The science geek in her revelled in the environment, and although she had tried to curb her geeky reactions and gasps, Troy had merely kissed her and murmured by her ear that "smart chicks are hot, don't try to pretend this stuff doesn't excite you." They had an early dinner in the city, and then were back at Gabriella's place by 9pm. A frantic make out session on the couch later and he insisted that he had to go – she offered that he could stay over if he was too tired to drive. He was tempted, but knew that staying would only encourage other temptations and so he did the gentlemanly thing and returned home, but only at the promise that he'd come back the next day – a promise which he obliged to. They hung out in her apartment, ordering in Chinese food for lunch and watching a couple of DVDs. At 3pm he'd dragged himself away, citing that he had to go to work. It was the first time since he'd started his double job work life that he truly lamented the lack of freedom it afforded him in his personal life.

Gabriella somehow managed to force herself to be productive on Monday despite all of her daydreaming, and was startled when her personal cell phone began to ring. She glanced at the screen, lips curving into a smile. She picked up her phone, answering it immediately, keeping her voice low.

"Hello," she said, a little more formally than she'd like.

"_Hello you."_

"Can I call you back in... two minutes?"

"_Sure, but no longer than that."_

She giggled. "I promise," she said and hung up. She quickly gathered her purse from under her desk and her coat from the back of her chair, wrapping it around her.

"Just ducking out quickly, I won't be long," she informed her team, and practically skipped out of the office. The minute that she was stepping out on the street, she had her phone back in hand, returning his call.

"_That was two minutes and thirty seconds."_

"I'm sorry, Mr. Bolton," she apologised flirtatiously.

"_You have a fixation with this Mr. Bolton thing. Kinky schoolgirl fantasy?"_

"Only with certain teachers."

"_Lucky guy. Good thing you're legal and a graduate. Did you just go outside?"_

"Yeah. People keep asking me why I look happy. Seems that I'm that person who has a whole different demeanour after having a great weekend."

"_Great weekend? Did some guy show you a good time?"_

"In a sweet, caring, gentlemanly way which makes me almost wish he hadn't been such a gentleman."

"_All in good time," _he laughed. _"I'm counting down the hours until Thursday at 11:59pm."_

"So the kids start vacation on Friday?"

"_Yup."_

"And how do you plan to celebrate?"

"_Firstly by taking this really gorgeous woman out for melted cheese and chocolate."_

"Friday night?"

"_If you like."_

"I would like, very much so."

They continued to talk for the next ten minutes as Gabriella headed up the street to a cafe, making a quick order for her lunch to go and then taking a seat in one of the waiting lounges.

"_I guess I'd better let you go, and I should go too. I just... really wanted to hear your voice."_

"Thank you, you can make a habit of it, if you like."

"_I'll try not to, I don't want you to get sick of me just yet."_

"I don't think it's possible to have too much Troy Bolton."

"_Do me a favour? Please handover today. Even if the talk will be strictly professional."_

"I will, I promise."

She lived up to her promise – shooing Kelsi and Martha away and waiting until 5:15pm to make sure that he would have had time to arrive and settle in before calling through. She lucked out – Troy answered the call.

"_Thank you for calling Inspire..."_

"Hi you," she greeted him softly.

He cleared his throat. _"Hello to you as well."_

"This is kind of weird."

"_A little, but we're both professionals,"_ he said with a laugh. _"How has your day been?"_

"Good. Long."

"_Same."_

"Are things looking busy over there?"

"_Pretty good so far. Things are slowing down everywhere. The clients are generally... what's the word?"_

"Merrier?" Gabriella supplied.

"_That works. I suppose it's that good old festive spirit."_

"Everyone seems to be feeling the festive vibe."

"_Mmm... I've read your handover e-mail by the way."_

"Nothing to action."

"_Uh-huh... I wish I had my own office."_

"Having to censor?"

"_Yup. Are you the last one left?"_

"I think so, but you never know around here, could be someone tucked away in a private office."

"_Can you hang on a tick..."_ There was a muffled sound, and then Troy sighed into the mouthpiece. _"I have to go. Jacqui has Seattle holding for me to handover."_

"Oh."Gabriella was disappointed, but understanding. "Call me on your break?"

"_Definitely. Counting the minutes."_

Gabriella felt the immediate pang of separation when she hung up the phone – at least he had work to distract him, she just had an empty apartment to return to. She felt somewhat miserable the whole journey home – and then, as she was reheating some of the leftover Chinese food from their lunch the day before, she found herself being struck by a bright idea. She brought her Chinese food to her living room sofa, but instead of flicking on the television, she opened her laptop and logged into her e-mail.

Sender: Gabriella Montez

Time: 7:15pm

Subject: Company.

_Is this more discreet than sitting with your phone in hand all night texting?_

Sender: Troy Bolton

Time: 7:17pm

Subject: Welcome Company

_So much more discreet, and so incredibly appreciated. Tonight blows. Slowest night ever. I actually want some sort of client emergency to happen._

Sender: Gabriella Montez

Time: 7:20pm

Subject: Company provided any time

_Good, glad I can be of service ;) Poor baby, I feel bad for you. Did you bring that marking you procrastinated from this morning?_

Sender: Troy Bolton

Time: 7:24pm

Subject: Any time? Any place?

_I'm sure there are many services of yours that I may be able to benefit from, at some point in the future. ;) Hey, I did not procrastinate, I was distracted. Big difference!_

Sender: Gabriella Montez

Time: 7:28pm

Subject: Name it.

_Hopefully not the too distant future. And you send the first text, I am merely a polite person, responding to your conversation starter._

Sender: Troy Bolton

Time: 7:34pm

Subject: Always. And wherever you are.

_I'm wary of saying what I really want to in e-mail – firstly company e-mail, Big Brother is watching etc. And also for fear of sounding like a sleazy douche. And I suppose I can concede that I did start it, even if your logic is somewhat grade school 'he started it' type of mentality._

Sender: Gabriella Montez

Time: 7:38pm

Subject: My place, on the sofa.

_I concur in your sentiment about wariness of company e-mail usage. As for sleazy douche... no. Not possible. And well... maybe I'm grateful that you started it? :)_

Gabriella sat waiting by her e-mail for five minutes, not receiving a response, but then her cell phone began to ring. She smiled.

"Good evening."

"_Woman, you're killing me."_

She giggled. "Sorry."

"_No more e-mails with undertone. Fuck Big Brother, I'm more worried about my imagination and... and..."_

Gabriella felt herself blushing profusely, but she felt flattered. "Can we talk about that imagination one day?"

"_One day. When we're both in private." _

His voice sounded strained, and she felt apologetic. "Sorry... I'll stop, I swear."

"_Good girl. You go relax... no more e-mailing me. I'll do my marking to entertain myself."_

"Troy?"

"_Yeah?"_

"I..." she trailed off, and then changed her tact. "Hope you have a good night."

They discontinued the call, and she stared at her phone in her hand, regretting wimping out on what she'd really been about to say. She clicked upon a text message, and typed a quick message.

_PS: I miss you._


	23. TWENTYTWO

_**SERENDIPITY**_

TWENTY-TWO

_~ Thursday 22 December, 2011 ~ _

Catherine pulled Gabriella into her office on Thursday morning.

"You've been doing awesome work this week, Gabriella, really stepping up into a leadership role, making sure everyone stays focused and gets their work under control before they go on leave."

"I have to – I'm the one who will have to deal with any outstanding crap!"

Catherine laughed. "On that note, I would like to request that you take a day off tomorrow."

Gabriella furrowed her eyebrow. "Oh but..."

"No, I'm pretty much going to insist. You haven't taken any leave in six months. It is proven that there are links between employee morale and having adequate rest time from work. You have Monday off due to the Christmas Day public holiday, and I'd like you to not come in tomorrow, take an extended long weekend."

Gabriella pursed her lips, thinking it over. Troy's school was breaking for the Christmas vacation that afternoon, and they already had plans to spend Friday evening together. If she wasn't working on Friday, that would give them an extra time to spend together.

"Okay," she said simply.

Catherine's eyebrows raised. "I expected you to protest a little more."

Gabriella laughed lightly. "I'll enjoy the time off, you're right. Thank you for pushing me."

"Well I'd better let you get back to it – you'll be right to get everything sorted for the rest of your team to monitor tomorrow?"

Gabriella nodded. "It'll be fine. I'm here next week, after all, the bits and pieces and reports which everyone else needs to finalise, I'll have the peace and quiet next week to make sure I finalise before end of year."

"If you do run into any problems next week, please don't hesitate to call me, I'm not going away I'm just taking some time to spend with my family, so I'm just up the road if anything diabolical happens."

"I'm glad to know that the option is there, but I'll avoid making that call at all costs. You deserve to properly enjoy the time off."

The rest of the day went by like a whirlwind. Gabriella secretly texted Troy throughout the day – she got the impression that he was in a bad mood and some of the kids were being a little unruly and testing his patience. She didn't mention her day off yet, deciding she'd save it for later as some good news to cheer him up. She whipped through all of her work, only leaving a couple of things for her team to follow up on the following day, and wrote out holiday e-mails with Christmas headers that _Inspire_ had designed for them to send to all of their clients. She was sure to mention in each of her e-mails that _Inspire_ would not be operating on Sunday and that she would not be in the office again until Tuesday, instructing that any urgent requests were best to be called through on the office number.

She felt a sense of relief going home that evening – Troy aside, Catherine was right about the value of having time off from work. Four whole days in a row where she didn't have to worry about going into work, where she didn't have to think about her clients or what report was due.

But along with the sense of relief, was a sense of longing – she was desperate to see him. It had been a wonderful but long week of text messages and phone calls and e-mails, that became increasingly flirtatious with an edge of innuendo as the week had progressed. In some ways it was madness, they'd only spent the one weekend together, but Gabriella was pushing aside the madness and focusing on that feeling in the pit of her stomach and in her fingertips and in her heart that it was _right._

And then, she was hit by a whim of inspiration; a wave of spontaneity overtaking her. In a hurry, she found herself grabbing her coat and purse, dashing down to the parking garage and jumping into her car and driving across the San Mateo Bridge and then onto the Interstate 880 heading north.

It was one of the longest days Troy had experienced. Nothing about it was particularly different, it wasn't that his kids had been brattier than they usually would be the day before a school vacation, or that the clients were more demanding than usual. But rather, it was just his general mind frame. The time it was taking to come to the weekend was excruciatingly long. He'd never been quite as excited about a Friday night coming around. Because yet again, he had plans for Friday night that were something beyond a couple of beers with some buddies, much more exciting plans. It wasn't that he'd made elaborate plans but just the prospect of seeing her was enough. They'd been texting all afternoon, but the last text he'd sent just after 6pm hadn't been replied to, and now he was feeling somewhat on edge – somehow just knowing that she was out there thinking about him was soothing.

"Yo Bolton, did you order a pizza?" Chad called out across the office. "If so, why didn't you tell us?"

"Yeah, I could so go for some pizza right now," Jimmy said enviously.

Troy looked up in confusion. "Huh? No?"

"Well some chick just called and said to tell a T. Bolton that his pizza is here and to come down to get it."

Troy sighed irritably. "I didn't order pizza."

"Hell if there's pizza here, just go get it, I'll eat it!" Jimmy declared.

"I'll go check it out," Troy said, rolling his eyes.

He grabbed his office keys and cell phone, figuring he would take advantage of the trip down to the lobby to make a quick phone call. He rode the elevator down, emerged into the foyer, and then looked up at the locked doors.

To see her.

An instantaneous smile broke out onto Troy's face - he couldn't even just smile charmingly or give her a wave. He barrelled toward the door, pressing the green button by the door to make them open.

"Why hello you," she greeted him with a wide smile as she stepped into the office building and the automatic doors slid closed behind her.

"Why are you... oh wait, I don't care why..." he murmured, and took her by the waist, pulling him into her and pressing his lips to hers hard.

She moaned into his kiss, allowing him to deepen it and responding to his kiss with fervour. They pulled apart, matching wide smiles.

"I was... I was so nervous about coming here," Gabriella admitted. "It seemed kinda crazy spontaneous not like me at all but... I just... tomorrow didn't seem soon enough."

"You're utterly insane for being here, but I'm so, so glad."

Again he pulled her into his arms and started kissing her, this time guiding her back against the wall beside the door. Her arms were wrapped around him, clutching onto his shoulder blades, running her hands over his black polo shirt.

"Well well well. What do we have here?"

They froze, the voice from behind them startling them. Troy and Gabriella both looked up to see Chad, who was leaning up against the wall having just emerged from the elevators into the lobby.

"Err... what can I say? Now that I've spent time here, I feel like I can't stay away," Gabriella said lamely.

Chad snorted. "Yes, I'm sure that all of us are your incentive for coming here."

Troy glanced over and could see that Gabriella's cheeks were slightly red. He rubbed her back consolingly.

"Uh... sorry I didn't tell you, dude," Troy said apologetically. "But it's new and... well, it's kind of sensitive. Gabriella doesn't really want people from work to know about it."

"I get that," Chad said, a tone of seriousness. "But _I_ am not people from work."

"I know, I know. Sorry man."

"You," Chad said, pointing at Troy. "Will give me details later. As for you," he gave Gabriella a wink. "I'll be seeing you soon because any one who can get my boy Toy here into a frenzy must be worth my time too."

"Uh... thanks? I think?"

"Oh, and not sure what your plans are for Christmas, but Taylor is hosting a shindig on Sunday night, just people over for a few drinks," Chad told her. "No one else from work is invited and so on her half, I'll extend the invite to you, if you're interested."

"Um... thanks. I'll think about it?"

"No pressure, the option is there. I'll continue on my way, just going out to pick up some food – Troy, if you don't want to arouse suspicion you might wanna hurry up with... whatever this is. Laters."

With a smirk and a wave, Chad headed out the door.

"Chad won't tell anyone, I swear. Well... just Taylor. But they're two of my closest friends and I promise they won't spread it around."

Gabriella sighed. "I can't be upset, what did I expect would happen if I showed up here unannounced? That we'd shake hands politely, exchange a cordial greeting and I'd walk away before anyone came in or our of the building?"

Troy laughed. "I'd hope not!"

She smiled. "When will you go on your half hour?"

"I can push to go an hour from now? Probably not any earlier."

"That's fine. I can kill an hour, longer if you need it. Think about where I can meet you and send me a text and let me know when you think you can get out. I don't mind how late it is."

Troy pressed another soft kiss to her lips and murmured softly, "You're amazing. I might actually get through tonight. Thank you for coming."

She watched as he headed back toward the elevator, and blew a kiss after him.

An hour and fifteen minutes later, Gabriella was seated at a coffee shop which, according to Troy ,was the second closest coffee shop to the Oakland office so unlikely that anyone ducking out on a break would come in there. He was there about five minutes after he indicated he'd arrived, a pretty good estimate as far as Gabriella was concerned. He slid into the bench seat, sitting beside her at the table rather than across the table in the chair, and pressing a hot kiss to her lips, slightly more PDA like than Gabriella usually preferred but Troy was making her throw a lot of her former values out the window.

"You get exactly half an hour with me here, if I allow time to walk back, I can push to 45 minutes and no more for my break without raising eyebrows," he announced after pulling away from the kiss.

She smiled. "I've got a hot cocoa on the way for you."

"You're the best," he declared, smacking another light kiss to her lips. "So, since you're here, let's figure out the plans for tomorrow night. What time do you finish and what time will you get home? I'll be there a minute later, no more."

"Actually... I got some good news today," Gabriella said with a smile. "I'm taking tomorrow off."

"You are? No work tomorrow?"

"No work tomorrow," she confirmed.

Troy smiled brightly. His response was yet another kiss to her lips. "Do I get the whole day with you?"

"If you like."

"Damn straight I like, I more than like, I insist."

"I'll have to see if my boyfriend will let me have the day to myself," she joked teasingly, pressing her finger to her lower lip in mock contemplation.

"Your boyfriend?" Troy repeated, a smile curved on his lips.

"Mmm-hmm. Me and Leo, we're like _this,_" she declared, holding up her index and middle finger crossed.

"You and Leo?" he suddenly felt alarm, a moment of wondering if maybe she was actually being serious and not teasing and if this Leo was a real person.

"Leonardo DiCaprio," Gabriella elaborated.

Troy immediately felt relief, and laughed. "Babe, I'm sorry to tell you this, but Leonardo is probably busy with one of the many, many hot models he spends his days with."

Gabriella mocked a pout. "Really? I don't know if I want him to be my boyfriend any more. I'm more of a one man kinda girl, you know?"

Troy responded with complete sincerity. "That's good to know, because I'm a one woman kinda man."

Gabriella walked Troy back to the office, and he walked her down to her car again – she'd parked in the _Inspire_ parking garage. After a series of quick, frantic kisses they held each other in a long hug. He held her slender frame tight within his embrace, and pressed a tender kiss to the side of her temple.

"I will be at your place at the crack of dawn with a double strength coffee in hand," he murmured, referring to their plans to spend the whole next day together, starting with breakfast.

"Not a minute later."

Gabriella was lying in bed just before 1am. Evidently her body was celebrating the lack of having to attend work the next day, and she wasn't feeling an inch of tiredness, instead still feeling wired. She wasn't sure what 'the crack of dawn' was for Troy but she knew that she couldn't wait. She finally put her book aside, telling herself that she needed to force herself to sleep but she knew it just wasn't coming.

Then, she heard her intercom system buzzing from the living room.

She frowned, figuring it was some kids playing a joke and hesitating from going to respond, but then it buzzed again. She swung her legs out of bed and padded out to the living area where the intercom was on the wall.

"Hello?" she said tentatively.

There was a pause, and then a reply. "I couldn't wait."


	24. TWENTYTHREE

_**SERENDIPITY**_

TWENTY-THREE

Gabriella had the door open and was waiting. She could hear the ping of the elevator down the hall opening, and a moment later, he appeared in front of her. He gave her the quickest of once overs, looking down at the pale blue night gown she was wearing with a reasonably demure neckline, and fell mid-thigh, and looking back up into her eyes with a look of desire. There were no words needed, she merely yanked him inside of her apartment. They stood kissing in the entry way, and then she pulled him toward her living area and onto the sofa where they resumed kissing.

Their kissing was reminiscent to teenagehood make out sessions, desperate and passionate and eager. They were both a little cautious of whether the other one would feel like they were moving 'too fast', keeping the hand contact as appropriate as one could while desperate to feel and touch and caress every inch of the other ones body. They were at first sitting upright, but as Troy took the lead Gabriella found herself lying back, Troy just to her side, avoiding placing his entire body weight on her slender frame. There were no words exchanged, the only sounds came from distant street traffic that could faintly be heard, and the sounds of lips pressing together and little pants and mewls escaping from their mouths.

Troy was the first to take the heated session to the next level, his hand which had been holding onto her waist gliding up her body. At first they rested on her upper abdomen, just his thumbs grazing against the lower side of her breasts. When he received no signal that it was a no go zone, his hand moved further up, grasping onto the perfect handfuls of flesh, allowing this thumb to circle around what was becoming an increasingly pronounced nipple. He broke away from their kiss to instead focus on trailing kisses along her jawline and then honing in on her neck, nibbling and kissing the flesh just below her ear. Gabriella was pressed into his neck, nibbling lightly on his ear.

And then she yawned.

Immediately, she froze, her hands which were currently situated with one holding his bicep and the other on his back, freezing their movements.

"Did you just yawn against my neck?" Troy murmured in question.

"Um... yes..." she squeaked out in confession.

She could feel him shuddering against her, and then he started openly laughing. "Am I boring you, Gabriella?"

She joined him in laughter but felt embarrassed. "Sorry... No! God no. But.. I'm tired. It is after 1am, after all."

He pulled back, smiling down at her as she looked embarrassed. He held her cheek, rubbing this thumb lightly.

"Go to bed," Troy urged her.

"But..." she gave him a look – there was no need for words. It was a look of hunger, a look of desire.

"When you and I... when this happens – we're both going to need a lot of energy," he remarked with a teasing smile, pressing a tender, sweet kiss to her lips. He then pulled completely back and stood up, taking her hand in his and encouraging her to stand up with him.

"You're going to stay with me, right?" she asked, somewhat shyly.

"If you want me to to, yes."

"Do you need anything?" she asked. "I um... I kind of just mauled you when you arrived without like, being at all hospitable."

"On the contrary, you were _extremely_ hospitable," he returned teasingly, before answering seriously. "Don't suppose you have a spare toothbrush? And a glass of water."

She led him into the bathroom, fishing out a spare toothbrush with a blue handle from her cabinet – thankful that she was the practical kind who bought the package of seven toothbrushes because it was better value for money. She left him with the toothbrush and her tube of toothpaste and returned a minute later to find him spitting out the last mouthful of foam, and she handed him a glass of water she'd retrieved from the kitchen. He immediately gulped down a large mouthful. Gabriella let out a sleepy yawn.

"Go on into bed, I'll go switch off all the lights."

She smiled gratefully. "Check the door is locked? And the balcony door?"

"I will."

Gabriella padded back into her bedroom where she'd been lying not so long ago, the bedspread still pulled back, and snuggled down under the covers. She heard the sound of light switches flicking on and off, and then heard a minute later the toilet flush from the bathroom, the tap running, shuffling outside. It was nice – the feeling of knowing that someone else was in her apartment.

He slipped into her room and surveyed the area quickly, smiling at the sight of her curled up in her covers, facing away from the door. He flipped off the main light switch and then sitting on the edge of the bed.

He asked softly, "Are you going to be offended if I take my pants off?"

She giggled sleepily. "You can take off as many clothes as you want."

He smirked. "Sleeping, remember? Maybe I'm better off keeping my clothes on... or sleeping on the couch."

"No," she said immediately. "Here. I want you here."

He smiled, and slipped off his pants and pulled off his t-shirt, leaving them in a puddle on the floor by the bed, which left him in just a pair of navy cotton boxer shorts. He climbed into Gabriella's bed on the side that was free, immediately enveloping her body in his, enjoying the sensation of her bare arms against his, her bare legs entwined with his.

"It's a crime that you're shirtless and the lights are out," she murmured, rolling over and placing her hands on his pecs and roaming lazily over his front and upper arm.

"I promise you can see me shirtless in daylight tomorrow," he laughed.

"I can feel you're ripped. When the hell did you find time to work out? Do you have weights you use while talking on the phone?"

"Ssshh no talking. It's bed time."

"Yes mom."

Troy laughed as she wriggled around, rolling back over to face away from him and settling back into the classic spoon position before they lay still for a couple of minutes.

He murmured by her ear, "Good night, beautiful."

...

_AN: Tomorrow's update will come earlier - I'm flying to NZ for a quick vacation tomorrow evening. I am not sure what my internet access will be like while away but I endeavour to update at least once whilst I'm away, even if I have to go to an internet cafe. Otherwise, I'll be back on the 3rd. I'll be aiming to finish writing this story while I'm away to ensure quick updates upon my return. _


	25. TWENTYFOUR

_**SERENDIPITY**_

TWENTY FOUR

_~ Friday 23rd December, 2011 ~_

Gabriella awoke to the sensation of someone suckling against her neck and kneading her breast. At first she felt dazed, almost as though not certain if it was actually real life. But as the form of a warm, firm, male body pressed against her from behind became more evident, she realised that it was in fact real life.

"Good morning," she murmured sleepily, lips forming into a smile as he pinched lightly at her nipple, a slight moan escaping from her lips.

"You have been wriggling against my erection for almost an hour. You're either having a dream about dancing, or it's the kind of dream that I wish was real life," he murmured.

"Mmm... the latter..." she revealed.

Gabriella allowed herself to revel in the sensation of his touch for a few moments longer, but then shuffled over, rolling onto her back so she could face him.

"What is your position on morning breath?" she queried with a teasing smile.

"If both parties have morning breath, then it cancels the other one out," Troy said decisively.

"Agreed."

Her hands wrapped around his neck, pulling him back down and bringing his lips to hers, her fingers threading through the tendrils of hair at the nape of his neck as they kissed.

"You're so bad," she murmured between kisses. "Getting a girl... hot and bothered... first thing in the morning."

He pulled back, smiling mischievously. "You managed to get me hot and bothered before even waking up, so I think you're the naughty one."

She grinned – she had already _felt_ the affect that she'd had upon him. _"_Oops?" she supplied with a giggle.

He didn't respond, just resumed with the making out. She was contently exploring his chest, making no secret of her lustful gazes at his abdomen and pecs and biceps now that there was a sliver of light entering the room from the daylight through the curtains, allowing her to see him. She was coming out of her first thing of the morning half asleep stupor fairly quickly. She found herself perking up even more so as Troy's hand left her breast, travelling down her side, over her hip and to its position now resting on her upper thigh. She shivered at the sensation.

"Cold?" he murmured.

She shook her head. "Very warm."

His movements were gradual, testing the waters with each step – first on her outer thigh over the nightgown, then slipping beneath the nightgown, and then moving to her inner thigh. She didn't protest a single step of the way, in fact her legs parted just a little further, almost as an invitation to continue in the direction he was heading. He continued with his direction of travel, further up her thigh, and then gently rubbed this thumb over her cotton panties. He pulled away from their kiss, smiling down at her, but continuing with the gentle rub backward and forwards with his tongue.

"You're turned on," he observed, having felt the dampness.

"Mmm-hmm... Went to bed like this... woke up like this... then you just make it worse."

"Let me help you," he said, voice throaty, as his thumb circled around her clit, avoiding direct contact.

She didn't respond with a rejection, and just kissed him, which for Troy was as good as an approval.

Gabriella gasped at the sensation of his fingers slipping beneath the fabric of her panties. It had been a long time since anyone's hands but her own had been down there, and all the more better was that it was _him_ who was touching her. Normally she'd be a little shy, feel a little reserved about having a man touch her down there. She didn't have time or the care to contemplate when the last time she'd shaved was and if she was appropriately neat and tidy. There was nothing to concentrate on other than this skilful, dexterous fingers. Troy obviously knew what he was doing, he comprehended that complete finger penetration was no more effective than a carefully targeted pump, he knew the importance of the clit. There was something specifically more intimidate about having a man touch her than doing it herself – it was the exact same physical sensation but the reaction which it induced was far more stimulating with his touch. Combined with his hot, sensual kisses and the state she'd been in prior to his first touch, it didn't take long for her to tip over the edge, to gasp out in pleasure and to feel her sex pulsating around his fingers.

"Mmm, now that was a good morning," Gabriella said lazily, eyes still closed as she laid back on the pillow.

He chuckled and pressed a soft kiss to her cheek and murmured, "Be back in a sec."

She watched after him as he walked away, eyes raking over his sexy back and what she knew would be a cute ass beneath his boxers.

"I can feel you checking me out," he called behind him.

"I wasn't trying to hide it," she called back.

She heard him laugh with a bit of an echo, assuming he was in the bathroom. The tap ran briefly and he returned a couple of minutes later, returning to the bed beside her, snuggling in beside her.

"Thank you," she said simply, kissing him sweetly on the lips. "You brushed!"

He laughed. "Sorry. I don't mind that you haven't though."

She pouted momentarily but wasn't able to retain the guise, enjoying the sensation of being held in his arms. She began to rub a seductive circle on Troy's abdomen. "Um... do you..."

He responded by grabbing her hand and holding it still. "Not now," he said simply.

"But you uh... you seem to be... don't you..."

He laughed. "It'll go away. I'll take a raincheck."

"I promise to deliver," she responded with a giggle. She yawned, stretching a little in bed. "Do you mind if I go shower?"

"Not at all."

"Make yourself at home. If you want to make a coffee or breakfast... my place is yours, you know."

"I was thinking we could go out for breakfast, maybe?"

She smiled. "Sounds lovely."

Gabriella gave him one more quick kiss on the lips before heading into the bathroom. She showered quickly, before changing into a pair of jeans and a blue top. She emerged into the kitchen, towelling her hair dry, and found a redressed Troy sitting at the breakfast bar drinking a coffee, flipping through some junk mail catalogues she'd brought in the day before.

"If you want a coffee before we go, there's more in the pot," he told her. She smiled and grabbed herself a mug, pouring herself a coffee as well before pulling up the chair beside him.

"Is there anything in particular you want to do today? Any shopping you need to get done for Christmas?" he asked.

Gabriella shook her head. "Not really, I don't have any plans."

"Your mom is away overseas, you said?"

"Yeah. I was invited to a few holiday parties for tomorrow night but I uh... I don't know."

"Yeah. One of the other teachers at school invited me to a thing for tomorrow night but I don't think I'll bother. I was planning to go to Chad and Taylor's on Christmas Night. You know... the one Chad invited you to."

Gabriella cocked her head at him. "Are you... are you asking me to come with you?"

Troy scratched the back of his neck. "I don't want to spend any time away from you," he said honestly. "Today and the next three days, neither you or I have to work. Neither one of us is due back at work until Monday evening. And... call me needy and clingy but those fifteen minutes with you in the shower? I kinda wanted to barge in there because you were too far away."

Gabriella blushed, and said slyly, "I probably wouldn't have objected... but I understand the feeling."

"I know most people probably have a few more dates before committing to spending the whole holidays together but... fuck it, Gabriella, I'm crazy about you."

She slid off the stool, standing directly in front of him, resting her hands on his thighs. "I'm crazy about you too. A part of me wants to stop and ask what we are but I'm just loving every moment of this, whatever this is."

He nodded, looking into her eyes. "There's something here that I never... fuck. I thought you were funny and smart and sweet and your voice sounded cute as hell, and then people started to talk about how I had to meet you because you were hot. But I never thought... I never thought..."

"That we'd meet and... start to..."

"Fall?" he supplied.

"I'm so falling, Troy, and that... it doesn't scare me. I thought it would terrify me, but it doesn't. Instead it... it excites me. I feel excited about what might be in front of us. Am I... is it just me?"

"It's not just you. Not at all."

"Good."

His lips pressed against hers sweetly - and it was she who deepened the kiss. A sweet kiss wasn't enough. She needed so much more from him. She couldn't help but feel like she wanted everything, and more. She knew it was going to be hard, she knew that there were going to be battles ahead, but somewhere deep down, she felt like it was going to be worth it - that he was worth it.


	26. TWENTYFIVE

**SERENDIPITY**

_**AN:** Sorry for the delay guys! I've just gotten back from my overseas trip. I survived, despite the trillions of earth tremors whilst in Christchurch. I'm very much so grateful to be on solid ground. Thanks to all for your support!_

_TWENTY-FIVE_

After finishing their coffees they finally agreed upon a plan for the day. It was nonsensical to be taking two cars. Troy needed to go back to his place – he identified that he had no toilet paper, milk or bread and he wasn't particularly keen to be anywhere near a mall on Christmas Eve, and he also needed to get a few supplies to take something to Taylor's on Sunday night for their party. So they agreed upon a plan – they'd go in his car, head across to his place so he could quickly shower and change clothes, and then head to Southland Mall to grab brunch and do some shopping.

"Hey um... do you want to maybe pack a few things?" he said hesitantly. "Like... just in case?"

She could see he felt nervous asking the question, and so she couldn't help but tease. "Why, Mr. Bolton, are you suggesting that you might invite me to stay over tonight?"

He rolled his eyes and grinned. "I believe in being prepared. And I know you women prefer to have your own toiletries and things... just in case."

"Just in case," Gabriella echoed with a wink.

She threw together a quick overnight bag – and was sure to select sexy underwear and a cute nightgown.

Gabriella had never actually been into the Cherryland area before, the closest she'd been was Hayward, which was the next suburb over. It was fairly middle class, basic one storey homes and some two story townhouse complexes.

"Um... so my place is nowhere near as cool as yours," Troy commented. "Just... as a warning."

"Since I'm aware of your frugal living life plan, I wasn't expecting Buckingham Palace," Gabriella said with a reassuring smile.

"Good. Because it seriously isn't."

A couple of minutes later, Troy pulled up outside a one storey duplex. It was a pale blue fibro house which looked as though it had been originally one larger house, but remodelled to split into a duplex. "Give me a second."

She watched as he jumped out to unlatch his gate, and then came back into the car, then able to drive through into his small undercover parking spot.

"My neighbour is this old guy who is deaf as a door nail," Troy told her as he led her inside "I was worried when I moved in about like, sharing a wall with someone, but turns out it's not a problem at all."

"That's convenient," she remarked, throwing him a quick smile.

He unlocked his front door and then the screen door just inside, leading her inside. It was a small, simple one bedroom apartment. It was fairly basic and functional, but had a lot of touches which reminded Gabriella of Troy. He had a desk crammed into the corner of the living area, she could see what looked like a pile of exam papers piled up, family photos on a bookshelf, a healthy DVD collection. None of the furniture was brand new, the carpet was ratty and the walls were faded, but he'd added personal touches to make it a home, despite the imperfections of the place.

"Make yourself comfortable, I'll just be like, ten minutes, quick shower and a shave and we can head to Southland."

Gabriella reached out to rub her thumb over his chin, feeling the slight stubble. "Skip the shave for now, this is sexy."

"Noted, in which case, I'll just need five minutes."

The rest of the morning and early afternoon was spent among the throng of holiday shoppers at Southland Mall. They grabbed breakfast at Panera, spent a little time window shopping, picked up a small present to take to Taylor's for her holiday party, and Gabriella gave in to the allure of a holiday sale at New York & Company when she spotted a dress which was perfect for work half price. Troy obligingly waited for her to try it on, and even enjoyed the fashion parade.

"I hear Victoria's Secret is also having a sale?" he proposed cheekily as she disappeared back into her changing stall.

"They'll have a better post holiday sale," she called back to him.

After finishing at the mall, they headed to Safeway where Troy did a major grocery shop, claiming he didn't want to have to come back for anything for at least a week, and that he wanted to enjoy the two weeks he had of only working one job. Gabriella was also surprised to find him stocking up on fresh produce and meat.

"I kinda had you pegged as a microwave dinner kind of guy," she admitted.

He shook his head. "The opposite, actually. My dad kind of instilled in me good eating habits for training purposes and I suppose the habits stuck with me. I'm not the greatest cook, but I can throw together a stir-fry or a quick pasta dish without thinking too much. It's hard when I work, but I try to make meals and freeze them so I can take to work and reheat."

They returned back to Troy's place after grocery shopping, Gabriella enjoying the experience of helping him to put the groceries away, because it gave her an excuse to poke through his cupboards. She gathered two bags of items that appeared to be bathroom supplies and took them into the bathroom. She opened the bag, pulling out body wash and shaving cream, setting the bottles on the sink, and then smiled at the sight of the next item.

"Hey Troy..." she called back toward the kitchen. "Where do you want me to put this box of condoms?"

He didn't reply. She examined the box. He'd bought a large variety pack of _Lifestyles_ condoms. She was examining the description on the outside of the box and jumped a little when his arms wrapped around her from behind.

"And here I was thinking you'd be all bashful and blushing if you came across those," he spoke softly by her ear. "I very discreetly put them into my trolley and concealed under other things while you were looking at the lipglosses."

She smiled, ducking her head slightly. "What can I say? You bring out a whole other person inside of me."

Still clutching onto the condom box, she turned around in his arms to face him. He leaned down, initiating a steamy kiss, pulling away abruptly and leaving Gabriella seeking more, panting slightly.

"You tell me, where should I put the box of condoms? I can leave them here in the bathroom, here as a just in case, or I can go ahead and put them straight in the bedroom."

Her eyes were glazed over, staring at him, and in a whim of spontaneity, she found herself pulling Troy by the hand in the direction of where she was presuming his bedroom was, although she had yet to actually step foot inside the room. She was successful in her guess, taking a brief few seconds while opening the door to glance around and look at the room. The bed frame was black, his comforter set was navy blue with random vertical stripes of other shades of blue. It was a practical set up, he had a built-in wardrobe, black painted wooden furniture consisting of beside tables and a bookshelf, the kind with randomly shaped and uneven boxes. She didn't have time to observe much else, because she had a different priority, a priority which had been eating at her since that morning. She pulled him forward until she had manoeuvred him to sit down on the bed, with her standing in front of him.

"I think the box of condoms should go right here," she teased, and placed them on the bedside table in plain view, beside his digital alarm clock, which was in the shape of a basketball.

"Within reach?" he asked with a playful smile.

Gabriella moved forward, carefully placing a knee on either side of his lap, straddling him. "Yes," she answered throatily, before kissing him hard. "They _will_ be required."


	27. TWENTYSIX

**_SERENDIPITY_  
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TWENTY-SIX

Items of clothing scattered on Troy's bedroom floor, article at a time, cardigans, sweaters, blouses, shirts, jeans, all pooled on the floor of his room. The motions were somewhat of a blur of frenzied passion. Gabriella felt desperate to touch him, to feel him, to have his warm flesh pressed against hers. She was straddling him again, this time he was back against his pile of pillows and they were both far more sparsely dressed. She had no filter, no care for what she was saying or pleading or what noises were escaping from her mouth as his hands roamed and caressed and squeezed her body.

They were kissing slowly, passionately, as she was positioned over his black boxer briefs and the erection which was increasingly prominent within, grinding her lavender panties against them. He reached around behind her, his hands finding the clasp of her lavender lace bra and tossing the item aside. Gabriella normally felt a little self conscious about her breasts, but the thought only had one second to cross her behind before Troy's enthused response made all worries and self doubts float away. A murmured, "fuck, you're perfect" and then the follow up of his physical response, taking the time to touch and taste every inch of the sensitive flesh, leaving her nipples hard and tender. She could feel his penis getting harder as he took his time exploring her breasts, she was doing her best to reach to touch and caress through his boxer briefs but it wasn't enough. The moment that he pulled away from his suckling of her left breast, she was quick to alter the arrangements, rolling away from under him, hovering on top, and with a gleam in her eye pulling away his underwear to reveal his erection. She smiled in approval at the sight she saw.

She'd given blow jobs to boyfriends in the past, but somehow it had always felt like it was a step along the journey, something she would perform with a goal to assist him in preparing for the final stage of the proceedings. But with Troy, it was different. His penis was an extension of him, an extension of the man whom she adored. She found herself taking her time, touching and stroking and caressing; suckling and licking and teasing, getting to know each and every crevasse and vein. Her lips would wrap around the head, slowly bobbing back and forth before releasing with a pop, teasing the head with her tongue ever so lightly, trailing her tongue along the length. Troy was whimpering and grunting, leaving no doubt in her mind that her exploration was a mutually beneficial experience.

"Gabriella..." he grunted, carefully pulling at her shoulders, wordlessly encouraging her to discontinue.

With slight lament she gave his length one final stroke before crawling her way up his body. The lament dissipated the moment he pulled her down to kiss him, hot, wet, hard.

She felt his hands run down her torso, each one latching onto a side of her lacy bikini cut panties. She assisted him, lifting one knee as delicately and lady like as she could at a time to allow for the article to be removed, leaving both of them completely bare and exposed. Their lips met once more, this time ensuing in a passionate exchange of kisses, hands clawing, bodies writhing on the bed. Troy turned around their positioning, emerging hovering just over her. His hard length was at first nudging at her thigh, and then it brushed against the wetness of her exposed sex, both Troy and Gabriella letting out a vocal response. Troy couldn't help but physically react, his pelvis bucking, this time driving his length over her clit.

"Oh my God, Troy..." she moaned, fingernails digging into his back, encouraging him to continue with the teasing movement for a few more strokes.

"I... I need you," he murmured, voice thick, before continuing with their intense kiss for a moment.

"Take me," she responded between frantic kisses.

He gave her one more soft kiss before pulling back slightly, looking directly into her eyes, confirming that he'd interpreted the direction wrong. The look in her eyes was all of the affirmation that he required. Troy reached over to the conveniently located box of condoms, sticking safe with one of the less risque choices in the variety pack – a super thin condom, for that 'almost like you're not wearing a condom' affect – making quick work of the packaging, slipping on the condom, and moving back into position. She opened her thighs for him, and with one hand pressing down on her right thigh to keep her open, Troy's hard length sunk into her warm, wet flesh.

The moment that he penetrated her, she let out a gasp – she was feeling overwhelmed, overwhelmed by not just the physical sensation but the way that she was feeling, emotionally, at having him inside her. His hands were holding her thighs down as he thrust inside of her, positioned between her and his knees holding him up, his hands kneading at the flesh of her breasts. She ran her hands down his arms, holding them over his hands, the connection causing him to open his eyes and look straight at her. He shuffled forward, his weight redistributing and holding himself up over her with his arms, now close enough to press his lips to hers. Their lips were trembling, both with closed eyes, and as they pulled back from the kiss, Troy continued to thrust into her slowly, hovering just above her, gazing straight into her eyes. She lifted her head from the pillow, lips seeking his out once again.

She lifted her knees, needing to feel him deeper inside of her core, and wrapped her legs around his waist, the angle allowing for his penetration to go even deeper. Troy reached down with his thumb, pressing it between them and finding her wet, engorged clit. Hands clawed, lips pressed together, breaths simultaneously panted and mutters and moans and grunts filled the room as they both climbed the peak and then finally, Gabriella exploded, crying out as her climax came. A few thrusts later and Troy was there, joining her with his own climax.

Gabriella felt him roll away momentarily, shuffling around, and then rolled back – she could only presume dealing with discarding of the condom. Troy reached down for the tangled comforter, repositioning it over their bodies and holding her tight, bodies pressed together and limbs entwining.

"Fuck, you're amazing," he murmured by her ear.

"I believe that would be you," she responded, voice thick with emotion.

A soft, tender kiss later and they both drifted off into a peaceful nap.

The rest of the evening was spent in a series of passionate encounters – stirring awake from the nap and commencing with round 2 and continuing from here. They went out into the living room to grab some drinks and food and found that they'd overlooked one perishable item, a tub of ice-cream now half melted on the bench. It merely served as an excuse to eat the ice-cream, and Troy decided that the ice-cream was best served on Gabriella's breasts as she was on the kitchen floor. They had a shower together, keeping it to just a series of playful caresses, and then curled up with the intent of watching a late night movie. Half an hour into the movie and Troy was distracted by the skimpy material of Gabriella's nightgown, and the movie was long forgotten.

At 2am, finally they were both spent – and completely satiated. Curled up together naked, unable to be any more entwined without actual penetration, they both drifted off into a peaceful, restful sleep.


	28. TWENTYSEVEN

_**SERENDIPITY**_

TWENTY-SEVEN

_~ Saturday December 24th, 2011 ~_

Sheets twisted, hands clutching at the bed frame, fingers stroking.

...

Pulses rushing, bodies writhing, skin scorching.

...

Moans and cries of pleasure filled the room.

...

In the middle of the afternoon, Troy and Gabriella were lying together on the sofa, imposing upon themselves a break. Troy brought out a variety of quick snack foods he'd thrown together, tossing some corn chips and salsa onto a platter, chopping up some fruit. They had some soft music playing, despite the 'break' still too wrapped up in one another to pay attention to a DVD.

"Have you ever... I mean... there's been a before you, but it's never been... not like... not like this I have to tear your clothes off and have you _right now_," Gabriella raked her eyes over him again, letting out a groan. "I don't think my girlie bits will let me go again right now and yet, I want to."

Troy laughed. "Sorry to tell you, but I'm not sixteen and even if your girlie bits would co-operate, my man parts _definitely_ need some recovery time."

She smiled, stroking his bicep. "Your stamina has impressed me greatly, so there's no need to apologise."

"And a serious answer to your question – no, it's never been like this for me before. I've had great sex but this is um... this is something else."

They were both still inclined toward keeping things PG-13 for a little while, but craving one another's touch. A passionate, needy make-out session was the perfect solution. Their kisses were lazy and slow and luxurious, neither one feeling the pressure to get up or be anywhere.

Until Troy's cell phone began to ring.

It was in his bedroom, plugged in charging; and he made no effort to get up to answer it.

"What if it was important?" Gabriella murmured.

"Nothing is more important than you," he said, his tone with a touch of teasing but a lot of sincerity.

She smiled, and was content to ignore his phone the second time that it began to ring, too swept up in Troy's kisses and his tender hands and his hard, warm body. However the third time it began to ring, they pulled apart, Troy letting out a groan.

"At least see who it is," Gabriella insisted.

With a pout, Troy pulled himself up off the couch, doing a short sprint to grab his phone in time.

"Hello?" she heard him answer.

Gabriella sat up on the couch, taking a moment to smooth back her hair and readjust her clothing – well, his t-shirt and a pair of her yoga pants. Troy came back out into the living area, plopping himself down on the couch beside her. She listened to Troy's end of the conversation.

"Well, Anita, I was doing great until you called. I don't suppose you're calling to tell me I get the next week off, paid?"

Gabriella figured out it was Anita, the weekend shift supervisor at the _Inspire Solutions_ support team call centre.

"What kind of favour?" Troy asked warily.

Gabriella watched his face as it morphed into one of surprise, and then annoyance.

"You want me to come in, on my day off, on Christmas Eve? Seriously?"

He tilted his head back, eyes closed. Gabriella rubbed his arm comfortingly.

"You can save me the speech, Anita. I don't care that I'm missing my Sunday because the call centre is closed. I don't _need_ to make up the hours, you know for me this is just extra cash."

He pressed a couple of buttons and switched his phone onto speaker phone and pulled Gabriella close into his side as he asked the dreaded question.

"How bad is it?

_"I've got no one." _The despondence in her tone was clear to both Troy and Gabriella.. _"I've had three sick calls. No one is picking up their phone, or they're answering and they're out of town or have plans they __can't change. I just need help between 6pm and midnight. I'd cover it myself, but I've been here since 3am, I'm approaching my twelfth hour. Today has just been a mess, Troy, everyone we'd normally try to get in has already worked – both Chad and Taylor were in here today, and because Taylor's on salary, she's officially on volunteer time so I'm not letting her stay back. She's out the door as soon as I get all this sorted out."_

Troy had difficulty saying no when a woman was begging him on the phone, when they were clearly desperate. He knew that they were back to skeleton staff, and so three sick calls meant that she literally had no one. And despite the fact that he was enjoying his time with Gabriella, the reality was that they had no technical plans, other than having loosely mentioned making an appearance at her old college roommate's holiday party.

"What's in it for me?" Troy asked. "If I do you this favour... what am I going to get in return?"

_"Pizza on me?"_ Anita offered.

"Pizza, garlic bread, and those cheesy dipper things," Troy hit back.

_"Done."_

"What else?" Troy asked, playing hardball. "You're really not selling this up to me, it sounds like it's just going to be me there and no one else at this rate."

Anita went quiet, before placing her final offer. _"You can have a Sunday off, whenever you want, no questions asked," Anita immediately said. "Oh! I'll give you New Years Day off, if you want. Or pick another Sunday you'd prefer."_

Gabriella murmured in Troy's ear. "Tell her you'll call back in five minutes."

Troy was a little mystified at the request but didn't question it. "Anita, I have to make a call, give me a couple of minutes and I'll call you back, okay?"

"_Okay... even if the answer is no, can you make sure you ring me back?"_

"I will, just give me five minutes."

Troy discontinued the call and let out a elongated groan – and not the kind of groan which the apartment had been hearing for the previous 24 hours.

"She's fucking killing me, this is a joke," he groaned. "But I seriously don't want to be the asshole who said no to her! I feel bad, you know? But... our night... I just really don't want to be away from you. We're not gonna get much time like this, just you and me, and I want to make the most of it."

"I'll come with you," Gabriella volunteered. "She said they don't have anyone else, why don't I go and work?"

Troy cocked his head. "I thought you wanted to keep this quiet. If I say, hey, so, my girlfriend is here, she can help out..."

"Why don't you... hey – girlfriend?" she interjected into her own sentence.

Troy smiled. "Well... we did discuss the fact that we're both only into seeing one person at a time. Which... to me..."

She beamed, reaching out with her index finger and pressing it over his lips to silence him from continuing further. "Girlfriend," she echoed, this time, her voice firm, rather than questioning. "Um... what was I... right. Why don't you suggest they call me? Say I came and did some training and I mentioned wanting some extra cash," she suggested. "Oh – will Chad have told Taylor?"

Troy nodded. "Undoubtedly."

"Tell Anita to get _Taylor_ to call me. It might seem more plausible to Anita that Taylor could convince me. But Taylor will know why I'm agreeing."

Troy sighed. "Gabriella, I... I so appreciate you saying that you'll do this, but babe, you don't need to spend your Christmas Eve at work. Don't you have your party? You shouldn't miss that."

"I get that you don't want to say no - if I was in your position I'd be that pushover who would go in too. And all my plans... they're with you. I don't want to go to any of my holiday parties alone. So... if I have to choose between sitting at my place alone watching a crappy holiday movie and drinking eggnog; and sitting in an office with you by my side... I choose the office and you."

Troy didn't know how to respond – there was a tenderness, a caring in her tone which eclipsed a desire that was purely physical. He leaned forward, kissing her tenderly.

"Have we really been dating for only a week?" he asked softly. "Because... somehow it feels like longer."

She nodded. "It kinda scares me but at the same time it feels..."

"...right?" he finished.

A soft kiss later and the decision was sealed. Troy picked up his cell and called Anita back. "Anita... I'll do it... I get New Years weekend off, I get the pizza tonight and one final request."

_"Name it."_

"Is Taylor around?"

"_Um... yeah."_

"Put her on."

"_Okay, give me a minute."_

The call centre hold music sounded, and about thirty seconds later, Taylor picked up.

"_Troy," _she said, her voice apologetic already. _"I'm so sorry that Anita had to call you."_

"Taylor, just to let you know, you're on speaker phone and if you're around other people, I need you to keep your reactions neutral. You can refer in a generic, non-specific sense to my 'girlfriend' without naming names."

"_Am I on speaker phone with who I think I'm on speaker phone with?"_

"Hi Taylor," Gabriella piped up shyly.

"_Oh my God, you! I'm... I'm so happy for you guys and I feel even worse about interrupting!"_

"You should," Troy joked, before sighing. "Is it as bad as she says?"

"_Yes,"_ Taylor said bluntly. _"It's not busy at all, but we need to be 'open' up until midnight. We've literally had all three for evening shift call in unavailable, including Jacqui who I think is actually sick, she's been trying to find a doctor that was open today. And today they had two sick calls as well, which is why I came in with Chad, who was already doing some OT today. Do you want me to go through all our employees and tell you what they're doing?"_

Troy sighed. "No. I believe you."

"_Anita said you'll do it... with a catch."_

"The catch is that I want to come," Gabriella spoke up. "I... Troy's a good person and of course he was going to say yes, once he negotiated his terms. But... it doesn't seem right – both in terms of company policy and just morally – to have him there alone. And... and..."

"She can't stand to be away from me," Troy added cheekily.

"Troy!" Gabriella whined, pushing him playfully – but it was true. She couldn't stand to be away from him.

"Tell Anita that I suggested to you that you call Gabriella," Troy urged. "Say that when she was training with us, she asked about any extra work over the holidays, that she said she had no particular plans. Say she said it to you, or to me and I told you, whatever."

Taylor paused, and then responded, more so with a statement for the benefit of anyone who was hovering nearby on her end. _"I do remember her saying that... you make an excellent point."_

"Nice touch. Hey, you have your work cell with you, right?" Troy said, directing the statement at Gabriella.

"Yup," Gabriella answered him.

"_I'll run it by Anita – it is her shift, after all – and then give Gabriella a call and see what she says."_

"Hey if Anita doesn't buy that I'd come in... tell her that you're matchmaking," Gabriella suggested. "That Troy and I were flirting... and that if you tell me that he's going to be there then you think I'll agree."

"You won't be lying," Troy added with a smile.

Taylor laughed. _"Okay, good suggestion. Tell you what, if I have any problems getting her in, I'll give you a call and see what other bright ideas you have."_

"I'm pretty sure she'll agree," Troy joked.

They finished up the call and Troy let out a sigh. "Seriously, this blows. I hate being a nice guy sometimes."

"I just so happen to find that to be one of your many endearing qualities. We still get to spend the time together, from the sounds of it we'll be alone anyway. And then next weekend we'll get another full weekend together thanks to your excellent negotiation skills."

"Since when did you become Miss Silver Lining?" Troy asked with a smile. "Is this what getting laid does to you?"

Gabriella laughed, pushing him playfully, and responded, "Evidently. How about I conduct an experiment, no more getting laid, to see if my mood becomes sullen?"

"I don't approve of that suggestion in the slightest. The ramifications to others could be _dire."_

"Well... it'll be implemented until at least midnight tonight," Gabriella pointed out to him. "Allow for proper recovery time, you know?"

"I'll have you know, Miss Montez, that after that recovery time, my stamina will be back, and so you'd better get used to being in a cheery good mood."


	29. TWENTYEIGHT

_**SERENDIPITY**_

TWENTY-EIGHT

After Taylor had called and 'convinced' Gabriella to come for the shift, there was little time remaining before they'd have to get ready. Gabriella had a momentary freak out that she didn't have any work appropriate clothes with her, but Troy assured her that a pair of jeans and a top would be perfectly appropriate – they were just a call centre after all, and the usual dress code was more casual than a usual office. The only reason for a dress code at all was to maintain the sense that they were in a work environment. He too dressed down for the occasion, wearing a pair of jeans and a navy blue knit.

When they arrived, Anita was over the moon. They feigned that they'd just so happened to drive in at the same time and Anita didn't bat an eye. She took fifteen minutes to get Gabriella settled in, having her log onto the computer beside Troy's usual one, going over some basic protocols and getting her set up with access to their support team e-mail account. Troy assured Anita that he would take care of the rest. Before walking out the door she went through a few of the procedures that Troy would be in charge of ensuring were followed. He was quick to shoo her out the door, and then to turn back to Gabriella with a smile on his face.

"Just you and I, babe."

Gabriella had a slight panicked look on her face. "Okay um... what do we do? How... I'm... what if... did they give you a handover just then? I feel like you didn't get given much of a handover. It's just you and I here, you and I in charge of all of the United States of America and I feel like it's really just you because I..."

"Gabriella," Troy interrupted her. "We get an e-mail handover from team to team, just like you send through to us. So the day shift guys today each did a handover report which we can access. While Anita was setting up your access, I've already read through. It's dead. Your clients aren't in the office, they're out celebrating Christmas. You and I being here is honestly just a formality. They don't actually even have a lab tech on duty – just one on-call, 'just in case.'"

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure. We may get an occasional call, more likely from _Inspire_ staff calling in with pay queries and other boring shit. Relax. Let's put on some music."

Troy was right. In six hours, Gabriella answered the phone four times – although granted, Troy answered the phone the majority of the time. Two of the calls were just inquiring about their holiday hours, one was someone wanting to reschedule an appointment they had in one of the branches the following week, and another was a pay query from one of the contractors.

They spent their evening talking and laughing, joking and teasing. The pizza which Anita had ordered for them arrived at 8pm, and it was double the amount of food which the two of them could eat, which was fine by Troy because he planned on taking home the left overs. Gabriella was about to start trying to work on a report which she had due over the coming weeks but Troy shut down the behaviour straight away, distracting her with light, playful kisses.

Had the night been with anyone but each other, it would have dragged, but they were both still in the completely enraptured with each other phase whereby any time spent in the presence of the other was time well spent. Anita had left Troy with a few random chores that needed to be done, including taking out garbage since no cleaners would be in the next day and they didn't want to cause a pest problem. Gabriella took control of these, feeling a little guilty that they were actually paying her to hang out with her boyfriend. As it approached midnight, Troy began to take care of the business end of things – including making sure that the voicemail had been changed, to indicate that they were closed until 6am Monday morning, that he'd set up the 'out of office' e-mail reply for the official support team e-mail account.

He was all set and ready to go, and at precisely 11:59pm he put the out of office e-mail on to both the official account as well as his own e-mail address; and then dialled in to divert the phones. He turned back to Gabriella with a gleeful look on his face.

"That was pretty cool! I feel kind of... powerful," he mused.

Gabriella, on the other hand, was distracted by something else altogether. She rolled over in her chair to sit right beside him and leaned over.

"Hey Troy?" she said lowly.

"Yeah?"

"It's after midnight. Merry Christmas."

His lips curved into a smile. Without a doubt, it was the best Christmas ever. He gave her a soft, gentle kiss, before responding to her greeting lowly. "Merry Christmas to you as well."

Her index finger landed on his chest randomly, trailing up and down.

"I think I wanna unwrap my present now. Do I have to wait until morning?" Gabriella asked throatily.

Troy swallowed. "Mmm... how about... how about you wait 'til we get home. If you can be patient and wait until we get home, then you can unwrap it tonight..." He trailed off, and then added lowly, cockily, "and then play with it again in the morning too?"

She smiled. "What are we waiting for then?"

They were waiting for nothing, as far as Troy was concerned. He zoomed around, flicking off the lights, gathering their food and practically dragged her out. He locked the building – again taking a moment to enjoy that he'd been vested with the responsibility of locking an office which was almost never closed for business – and then turned to her.

"Can you carry this?" he asked, gesturing to the pizza box and bag in which he'd placed the smaller box with garlic bread, cheese sticks and a half consumed bottle of soda.

She obliged, taking the items from him, assuming he needed his hands free to do something related to locking the building – and instead, found herself being swept up into his arms, and let out a shriek. He was carrying her bridal style, a grin upon his face.

"Troy!" she shrieked.

"Okay. Time to go. Let's see if I can break my record to get home."

She giggled all the way down to his car, where he had to reluctantly set her down so he could unlock the car and get her safely inside.

"Hey Troy?" Gabriella said softly as they were headed south on the interstate.

"Yeah?"

"I feel bad that I didn't get you a proper Christmas present..."

"I didn't get you one either. And I don't need one, babe. Seriously, it's cliché but... having you here..."

"Is better than any present?"

He nodded. "Exactly."

"I feel the same."

"If you like, I probably have some ribbon, we could uh... be creative?"

Gabriella burst into giggles, her brain being filled by awesome imagery.

"I have no intention upon putting any extra... wrapping... around my present this Christmas. The goal is to remove the wrapping, not add more," she said, smiling as her hand rubbed on his right thigh.

He groaned, and pressed his foot down on the accelerator. "How fast does this thing go?"


	30. TWENTYNINE

_**SERENDIPITY**_

TWENTY-NINE

_~ Sunday December 25, 2011 ~_

The early hours of Christmas Day were spent kissing, touching, groping. Gabriella didn't really recall falling asleep properly after they got back to Troy's place from _Inspire's _Oakland office. She dozed somewhere between the land of wake and sleep, remaining just conscious enough to luxuriously stroke her hands against his hard flesh, some part of their bodies remaining connected - hands on bodies, a stroke against the others arm, a foot caressing up the other one's calf.

She had been half asleep when she heard a rustle, the distinctive sound of tearing, a wriggle on the bed - and then she felt him move in closer to her, a hand grasp firmly onto a thigh, lift her leg up and then his already rock hard member thrust into her from behind. Slowly he rocked back and forth, thrusting into her wet cavern, pressing kisses against her shoulder and neck, her hand reaching behind him to grasp whatever part of him she could.

Somewhere just before dawn she found herself sleeping a solid few hours, and when she woke up and began to stir, it took less than two minutes for him to respond accordingly to her being awake - more rustling, another tear, and he was hovering over her. Her sleepy eyes fluttered open to see his intense blue eyes gazing into hers, and he yet again plunged into her depths. She had no objections at all, and merely opened her legs wider, wrapping them around his waist to increase the depth and enhance the angle of his penetration.

"Good morning," he murmured by her ear, gasping.

"Mmm, good morning to you too," she managed to respond.

He should've been void of all energy due to their action filled, sleepless night; but somehow he found himself summoning yet another wind. He grabbed onto her legs, hoisting them up higher and pushing them back for her legs to hook over his shoulders. A throaty moan filled his bedroom with the first thrust into her whilst in the new position. She was trembling, her fingers clutched onto a navy sheet beneath them as her body pushed back with every hard thrust.

"Oh my God, Troy," she gasped. "Fuck..."

He grunted, spurred on and thrusting even harder, the depth of the angle encasing him with even more of us, the position making the fit even more snug and tight. Her hands reached out, grasping onto his biceps, her fingers clutching at the muscles.

"How... how far..." he questioned throatily.

The friction was unbelievable, in very few positions would the sensation of penetration alone succeed to bring her anywhere near to orgasm. However she could sense that he was close to tipping over the edge, and she needed just that little bit more to get her there within the timeframe.

"Mmm... need... something..."

He immediately responded to her request, a hand slipping down, stroking her taut stomach and then slipping down to stroke his thumb against her wet, engorged clit. His thumb stroked simultaneously with the thrusts of his pelvis, the build of sensation within her heightening. She could feel it within her, bubbling within her tummy and heart and toes and hands and calves and deep within her core. A few more strokes and a few more thrusts was all that it took; and Gabriella came undone, her body shaking as she let out her moan of ecstasy. He thrust a few more times as she came down and then she heard the grunt and felt him shudder and then finally, he came to an almost still.

Carefully, he lifted one leg at a time, placing her limbs back onto the mattress; and then moved to the side to collapse onto the mattress beside her. She pulled at the pillow that was weirdly smushed against the head board and repositioned it. Troy snuggled in behind her, spooning her into his arms, both of their heads resting on the same pillow.

"You know how to deliver an effective wake up call," she said wryly.

He smiled, laughing by her ear. He pulled her into his arms, her backside snuggling against his finally less than hard member. "Fuck, Gabriella... I just... you make me feel absolutely insatiable, I can never get enough of you."

"The feeling is mutual," she mumbled with a sigh. "Even if I am completely exhausted."

"Mmm... we've got nowhere to be for a while."

"Good."

"Then let's sleep, okay?"

She didn't need his permission, she was already halfway to dreamland.


	31. THIRTY

_**SERENDIPITY**_

THIRTY

Taylor lived in an off-campus apartment close to the University of California, Berkeley. Chad technically kept his own place in Hayward, but spent the majority of his time at Taylor's. On the drive to Berkeley, Troy took the time to explain in a little more detail the friendship that he, Chad and Taylor had.

"You've known Chad for a long time, haven't you?" Gabriella asked.

Troy nodded. "Yeah, since we were in preschool. We both came to California for college, me to Cal Berkeley and Chad to USF. We actually went to elementary school with Taylor, then she moved away to Washington. She turned up in one of my freshman classes, we were paired together for a project and wound up becoming friends when we did the 'so where did you grow up' conversation and realised we kind of used to 'know' each other. Chad came to one of my dorm parties one weekend, I introduced them and they hit it off pretty much straight away, but danced around the thing for a while."

"When did they get together?"

Troy paused to contemplate. "It was after they started working at _Inspire_... Taylor got the gig there first, and then Chad took the opportunity to get to know her better by working with her. I suppose it was halfway through sophomore year? I got the job at _Inspire_ when Chad quit, he actually came back to the job last year – trying to figure out what to do in life so in the mean time, he's back doing this to hang out with me and Taylor."

"Chad's really good at his job. He should think about applying for a job as a consultant."

Troy raised his eyebrows. "Seriously? He's not really... scientific."

"Not all of our consultants are scientific," Gabriella said, rolling her eyes. "He should talk to Jason, maybe about doing some work in sales."

"You can talk to him about it tonight," Troy pointed out.

"Maybe I will." She paused. "So you three are all really close?"

"Well... yeah. It's weird, like, if Taylor had gone to East High with us I don't think she and I would've ever got along. But I guess we all change a lot after high school. I was pretty much your average jock, I know she was her class president at her school in Washington, among other things."

"Guess it proves that everything after high school doesn't matter. I was the biggest nerd in high school, competed in academic decathlon's and worked on the yearbook and... okay, so I went to college and was pretty much the same person."

Troy laughed. "Except in the real world, being ridiculously intelligent _and_ good looking is appreciated. High school boys are so fickle."

Gabriella blushed. "Yeah well... it is true. I made some great friends in college, I'm still in touch with some of them. None of my friends from high school are still around though. You're so lucky that you and Chad have the friendship you do, its so rare."

Troy nodded. "I know it is. Which is why... well... I know you probably wish he hadn't caught us but honestly – he would've figured out sooner rather than later that something was up with me. I want him to know. He's... he's my brother, you know?"

She reached across, squeezing his leg. "I do know. I'm just not ready for a big declaration at work. I'd rather... you know, frame it the right way, rather than have my boss here about it via the gossip mill the day she gets back from her annual leave. As long as Chad and Taylor can keep it to themselves, just for now, then I'll be fine with it." She paused, and then added teasingly, "I know you need to have someone to complain to about me when you get sick of me."

Troy shook his head. "No, the opposite. No complaining. I wanna scream it from the rooftops just how crazy I am about you but... being able to tell my best friends is a good start, if that's all I get."

Gabriella blushed. "Oh..."

…

They arrived at the party hand in hand. Chad let them in, taking a moment to rib about the fact that they were a little late and Troy's hair was mussed up – the blush on Gabriella's cheeks confirmed Chad's suspicion that they'd gotten a little distracted in the car. Gabriella felt a little nervous at first, but soon found herself really enjoying the company of the people she was being introduced to. There were a few neighbours, but it was mostly college friends of Taylor's, a lot of whom Troy had also attended college with. Taylor and Gabriella had a similar education background, which meant that Gabriella had a lot in common with some of Taylor's college friends. Some of them, like Taylor, were still studying and others had gone straight from their undergrad into full time employment, like Gabriella, with the intent to go back and pursue higher education in the next few years.

Even with the various people around at the party, Taylor took the time to seek out Gabriella and to pull her aside, out of Troy's grasp for the first time all evening, bar a five minute separation when Gabriella had gone to the bathroom.

"Don't worry, I'll return her, I promise," Taylor said, rolling her eyes at Troy.

"You'd better!"

Gabriella giggled as Taylor led her into the kitchen to get a moment of privacy.

"I just wanted to speak to you one on one, obviously you know I know, and Troy has spoken to Chad about keeping things private and Chad has spoken to me but I wanted to tell you directly that I'm not the type to go spreading gossip around at work," Taylor began.

Gabriella blinked, and smiled. She appreciated Taylor's gesture, and her honesty. "Thank you."

Taylor smiled. "If I had the choice to keep my relationship with Chad a secret at work, I'd probably want to try it. We're fortunate in that management are lenient, given that we actually started dating a long time ago, when we were colleagues and then things became serious when he didn't even work for the company. But I do sometimes have to think about decisions I make, make sure that no one construes them as being some form of favouritism or... something."

Gabriella sighed. "I'm not too worried about it from _that_ perspective – we work for different offices, I'm not technically his superior in any way. But I just don't like gossip floating around, not when things are so new. He doesn't deserve that, either."

Taylor leaned over and, to Gabriella's surprise, gave her a hug.

"I'm so genuinely happy for you and Troy. He's... he's one of the good ones and he deserves to find the right person, someone who will treat him well, who will appreciate that they've got one of the good ones... and I know that you and I don't know each other extremely well, but my instincts about you are great. And Chad and Troy are pretty much inseparable so I guarantee you that you and I will be seeing a bit of each other socially."

Gabriella smiled and laughed. "Even working together nearly every night, they need to see each other more?"

"You'd think they'd get sick of each other, wouldn't you? I do admit though that I kind of have to keep them separated, like kids at school," Taylor laughed. "They may look like adults but around each other they both lose about ten years of maturity. Troy's on his best behaviour tonight, I think he's still trying to impress you."

Gabriella blushed. "He doesn't need to keep doing that, though I appreciate the sentiment. I'm glad to hear that he has an opportunity to cut loose, though. Troy is... sometimes I feel like he's ten years older than he is, you know? He's so focused on setting up himself for a future that I hope he isn't missing out on just living in the present."

"You're gonna be good for him, I just know it."

"He's good for me too," Gabriella admitted. She hadn't had the opportunity to talk about Troy with any of her girlfriends and she found herself feeling an instant comfort and rapport with Taylor, able to confide in her. "I just... I'm a little scared about how this is going to work in the long term. When the holiday season is over and we're back in that work grind."

"I've felt like he's been wearing thin for a little while," Taylor admitted. "He doesn't need to be at _Inspire_ as many nights as he is. He could just do an extra night or two and still fulfil his purpose of squirelling away more money. But no... he does it this way. As his friend I worry about him; as a supervisor, I'm very lucky to have him on my team. I do what I can to make things easier for him, I let him organise his breaks when they suit him, that kind of thing."

"He told me he thinks he'll do it for at least another six months, if not another year," Gabriella revealed. "That's... that's a long time. If we were a normal couple, in that amount of time, we would wind up spending various nights during the week together and... I don't know, things could progress faster, you know? We're making the most of the holiday season now, that's all we can do."

"A normal couple? Relative to what? What is normal? You are who you are, and he is who he is. Troy isn't perfect, _believe _me, but I'm sure a part of what you like about him is wrapped up in those imperfections. At least... it should be, if you are to continue to progress."

Gabriella stared at Taylor for a moment, quiet.

"What? Do I have something on my face?"

"No," Gabriella laughed, assuring her. "I just... you're right. You're so right."

Taylor smiled. "I know I'm right. Anyway... I'm here for you, I feel like we're much closer than you'd expect us to be, just from the little we've talked. Whenever you choose to reveal at your office, I'll support in any way I can if anyone has any issues. If I need to reassign California to someone else, I can do it."

"I'm hoping it won't come to that, since I don't know if I trust anyone else with my clients," Gabriella said with a laugh. "But thank you. I do appreciate it."

The women exchanged another hug, and then Taylor gestured back out to the party. "Come on, I should get back out there."

Taylor grabbed another tray full of nibbles she had from the fridge and they headed back out. Gabriella immediately spotted Troy – it was like she had a Troy radar, he could be hiding and yet her eyes were just drawn immediately toward him. He was standing talking with Chad and a couple of other guys who Gabriella hadn't met. Immediately, Troy's gaze turned away from his friends, meeting straight with Gabriella's, and smiling at her from across the room. He spoke to the guys, and then stepped away from them. Gabriella met him midway across the room, his hand immediately snaking with hers, the touch an immediate comfort.

"What was that about?" he asked lowly.

"Girl talk," Gabriella said simply.

Troy grinned. "You gave me good feedback, I hope?"

"Only the best."


	32. THIRTYONE

**SERENDIPITY**

_**AN: Soooo sorry for the delay - my home internet died! I spent six hours tonight working on fixing it, yay for being able to update!**_

THIRTY-ONE

_~ Monday 26th December, 2011 ~ _

On Monday morning, they'd made the trek back across the bridge to Gabriella's place, since she hadn't brought her car across with her. She'd told Troy that she could get the bus, but of course he wouldn't hear anything of it. After sleeping in and waking up for a morning tryst, they extracted themselves from bed, had a long shower together and Gabriella packed up her things.

At her place they wound up cuddled on the couch watching _Friends_ and when the disc came to an end, neither could be bothered to get up to put in the next disc and so they'd just remained cuddled up, Gabriella within reach of the remote to allow her to switch off the television and turn on the radio. Cuddling together became stroking, which became a luxurious make out session. Making out morphed into a slow, sensual lovemaking experience, not moving from the couch.

Troy had dressed accordingly that morning to need to go straight to work from Gabriella's, not wanting to have to leave a minute earlier than necessary. She packed him up with a few bits and pieces, he grinned as she handed him an old Chinese takeaway container with crackers and cheese and sliced up apple pieces and produced a large can of Red Bull which he hadn't spotted her buying at any point.

"When did you get this?" he asked, quirking his eyebrows. "I know you don't drink it so you didn't have it lying around."

"A woman needs to have some secrets," she said mysteriously, and placed the items into a plastic bag for him to put into his work bag which he had sitting on the counter.

He smiled and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her in close, holding her by the waist. "Thank you for my treats. They hardly make up for me not wanting to be there but... they help."

Gabriella reached up, stroking the side of his face with her hand lightly. "Haven't you had a girlfriend since working these two crazy jobs?"

He shook his head. "I've dated, casually but... not like this. Not a relationship where I wanna be with the other person during like, every waking minute of the day."

She felt her cheeks heating up and ducked her head. "We'll find a way to make it work. Right?"

He nodded, narrowing the gap between them even further. "We have to."

The deal was sealed with a sweet, soft kiss, before Troy pulled away begrudgingly.

"If I don't stop this now, I'll never wanna leave."

"Go, before I kidnap you and don't let you leave," she urged.

With a final light kiss, Troy picked up his bag and headed to the door. "I'll call you later, okay?"

"You'd better."

The door closed behind him and Gabriella found herself standing in her apartment alone. She'd lived alone for a while, and normally the serenity and quiet didn't bother her – in fact normally she enjoyed him, she always thought that the idea of being with someone constantly would be a little suffocating. The last few days that she'd spent with Troy though had proved otherwise. They'd spent almost every moment since early Friday morning together, only separating for bathroom breaks and quick conversations with other people at the party. Instead of it feeling suffocating, it had felt comforting. She liked knowing that someone else was there. The feeling of a weight lifting from the mattress beside her and the toilet flushing in the middle of the night hadn't been annoying, rather it had been a reminder that there was someone there. Standing alone in her apartment, she suddenly felt lonely.

…

When Troy went on his second break for the evening, his half an hour break, he headed down into the parking garage, slipped into his car and dialled her phone number, picking up just enough signal to make the call. They spoke in soft, hushed tones, Gabriella asking how the evening was going at work and Troy asking what she'd been doing.

"I've been reading, mostly. I wasn't very hungry, just had some fruit and yoghurt for dinner," she told him. "I should probably think about getting ready for bed soon. I'm surprisingly tired. Apparently I spent my holiday weekend in bed but not sleeping, go figure," she teased.

He laughed. "Wonder how that happened?"

"No clue."

There was a pause, and then a low question. "What are you going to wear to bed tonight?"

"You really want me to answer that? And then leave you to go back to work?"

"Oh fuck, so it's something hot, is it?"

She smiled. "I find it hot. Which is what counts, right?"

"You're gonna go to bed wearing something that you find hot? Fuck, I know what it means when chicks do that when there's no guy around."

She giggled. "I'll send you a photo. _Of what I'm wearing._ Not of..."

"You're not denying it!"

"What can I say? Apparently for women, once they start having sex, it sets hormones on fire."

"Wish I was there to help you deal with those desires."

"You will be," she said flirtatiously. "In my head."

He groaned. "Fuckkk stop it. I have to go back to work now."

"Do you want me to refrain from sending you that picture?"

"You better send me the picture or I'll come over there to see for myself!"

She laughed, and glanced at the time. "You'd better go. Taylor is only going to be lenient to a certain point."

He sighed. "I know. I just... I miss you already, even if I feel like a wang for admitting it."

"I miss you too. But this is evening number one. If we can't get through tonight, then there's no hope."

"You're right. Okay. Going now."

"I'll talk to you tomorrow."


	33. THIRTYTWO

**SERENDIPITY**

THIRTY-TWO

_~ Wednesday 27th December, 2011 ~ _

Tuesday had been no easier than Monday evening. Gabriella's day at work had been slow and boring. The majority of their clients were closed for the week, there was only basic monitoring of a few long term research projects going on. She was able to use the time to catch up on a lot of administrative tasks, cleaning out her inbox of old, irrelevant e-mails, reorganising her calendar, the things that she never had the chance to do during a normal work day. By lunch time though, she was very much so over it.

They had two full time staff members on: herself and a lab technician, and then one of the temp admin assistants who Gabriella had met a few times, Jenny. She had been given a special project to manage throughout the week, but she was also there over the few hours over lunch time to make sure that Gabriella had an opportunity to step away from her desk without leaving the phones unmanned. The highlight of the day was afternoon handover – not because she was so excited to home, but rather, because she had a murmured conversation with Troy. On her end, she was the only one in the building but on his end, he was in a busy call centre, attempting to be discreet.

Wednesday morning started off like any other day – taking back the phones from Oakland, checking if there was anything to action from overnight, checking her e-mails. It was quiet on all fronts. Gabriella had come better prepared though, bringing with her an array of entertainment options to ensure the day didn't drag.

Just before 11am, the door buzzer chimed, causing Gabriella to look up from her computer screen with a frown. Jenny had her own key to access to building, but she figured that she'd likely forgotten to bring it. She moved through the office, heading through reception and looked through the frosted glass entry way.

Even through the frosted glass, she knew that silhouette, and practically lunged forward for the handle, yanking it open.

"What are you doing here?" she gasped.

Troy beamed at her. "Well see, the kids are still on vacation and I find myself at loss of what to do with my time. I spent half of yesterday texting you anyway. So, I figured what better to do than to come here and take a look at how the important people work. I just might learn something."

Gabriella smiled widely. "I'm so, so happy that you're here. I'm bored out of my mind!"

He laughed. "Let me in, then."

She led him through, giving him the basic tour of the reception area, then gestured up a flight of stairs. "The lab techs lives up there, or you can take the elevator to the next floor. We've got one around this week, I'll take you up later to see him," she said, before heading through to the kitchen, filing and main office area. It was similar to the space that Troy worked in – an open floor plan, groups of desks together. He was amazed seeing all of the black screens.

"You're actually here alone?" Troy said incredulously, looking around the office. "I know you've told me but... it's actually just you."

She nodded. "It really is. Well me and Jenny, she's a temp who we have sometimes. She's in around lunch time for a few hours every day, they've given her a special filing project to do while there's hardly anyone around so she won't be in the way. She's also around just to make sure that I can take a break and the phones will still be manned."

"Oh, I should've asked before inviting myself in, is it okay that I'm here?"

Gabriella nodded, waving her hand dismissively. "Jenny won't even be here next week so I don't care if she knows who you are."

He smiled and breathed a sigh of relief. "Good, because I wasn't looking forward to having to behave platonically."

"Well she isn't here yet, she'll be here probably in about half an hour? She kind of keeps her own hours."

"I'm glad you've got someone here. I kind of pictured you sitting at your desk having to look after everything," Troy confessed.

"You were there last night. Did you have to do anything?"

"Not much," he conceded.

She nodded. "Exactly. It's absolutely dead. I don't mind it - every day is casual Friday. I'm catching up on so much stuff, plus having time to just... relax." She led him toward her work area where she had laid out a book, a shopping list, her laptop, an iPod.

"The laptop?"

"My personal laptop. With movies," she responded with a grin. "I've been Facebooking people, catching up on personal e-mails, doing my banking, paying bills, organising grocery lists, listening to music."

"And the company pays you for what?" he teased.

Gabriella laughed. "For forgoing spending the holidays with my family?"

"Touche."

She gestured for him to take a seat at the desk beside hers – usually Martha's desk – and sat down in her own desk chair.

"I have done a lot of work though, I got through a lot yesterday even if I was distracted by my cell all day. I work best in this sort of environment. Our office can be so noisy sometimes, I just don't operate very well. When it's quiet and the phones aren't ringing, I get to just put my head down and plough through it all."

"Hopefully it's not all work and no play."

Gabriella blushed. "I think the text I sent you around 10am yesterday would attest to the fact that it isn't all work."

He smirked – he recalled that text well. He'd slept in until 9am, which for him was miraculous when not up all night with a woman in bed, and then gone back to bed after breakfast and a shower to fire up his laptop, settling into bed with a DVD. He'd been entirely distracted from his DVD when she'd sent him a good morning text advising him of exactly what lingerie she was wearing.

"I didn't get that text today," he said with a tut.

"Don't want to make a habit of it – if you receive that text mid morning while you're teaching, you might not be able to keep the smile off your face in class."

He laughed. "This is true." He glanced down, observing her jeans and a red knit sweater. "Here I was looking forward to seeing you in your sexy pencil skirts and tight little blouses."

She laughed. "Um, my work wardrobe is a bit more demure than that. I think what I wore that night training with you guys is the sexiest thing in my wardrobe."

"Doesn't matter what you're wearing, it's what is underneath that counts," he joked.

She gasped and giggled, pushing him playfully. "Anyway, you haven't given me something."

Troy cocked his head, confused. "Huh?"

"You walked in here without so much as a peck on the cheek to say hello!"

"To make up for it, I'll have to give you more than a peck on the cheek," he murmured, and promptly leaned over to initiate a passionate kiss.

"Much better," she mumbled against his lips, and then continued the kiss.

Gabriella promptly pulled back from Troy the moment that she heard the beep of one of the internal doors opening.

"That'll be Jenny," Gabriella murmured to Troy, quickly wiping at her lips and straightening her clothes.

Troy pushed back just slightly in his chair, keeping close to Gabriella but still wanting to ensure appropriate distance.

"Hi Gabriella," Jenny's voice called through from the next room.

"Hey Jen," Gabriella called back.

A minute later, Jenny's head popped into the office - and immediately laid eyes upon Troy.

"Oh, I'm sorry..."

Gabriella hesitated. "This is my b... um..." she paused momentarily, a little flustered.

Troy wasn't shy about it, and held out his hand. "Gabriella's boyfriend. Troy. Nice to meet you."

Jenny smiled and stepped forward, accepting the outstretched hand. "You as well."

"Troy's a teacher and a workaholic, he can't handle having days free to himself whilst the kids are on break so he thought he'd come annoy us," Gabriella volunteered in explanation.

Jenny laughed. "Sounds logical to me, since there's not much going on here anyway. I'm just going to go busy myself in the filing area and leave you be," she said with a wink. "Let me know whenever you want to head out for lunch."

Gabriella nodded. "Thank you."

Troy rolled over in his chair the moment that Jenny popped away. "Now, where were we?"


	34. THIRTYTHREE

**SERENDIPITY**

THIRTY-THREE

_~ Thursday 29 December, 2011 ~ _

On Thursday, Troy returned to the _Inspire_ office in Palo Alto, a little earlier, arriving at about 10am. The day before they'd spent doing very little, mostly talking and listening to some music. On Thursday Troy began to feel a little bit guilty, so he insisted that Gabriella take some time to train him in the ways in which they operated in the branch. It was quiet enough that Gabriella could go through quite a bit with him. It was unfortunate in a way because she could sense the potential in him to step up into a full time consultancy role, just as she had when the tables had been turned and he'd been training her.

After a few hours of working with the briefest of interruptions – Jenny arriving at about 12:30pm to let them know that she was there – and a couple of client phone calls, Troy heard Gabriella's stomach rumble lightly.

"Hungry, babe?" he questioned.

She wrinkled up her nose. "A little," she admitted, and then her stomach grumbled louder, causing him to laugh. "Okay, yes."

In perfect timing, Jenny chose that moment to re-enter the main office area.

"Hey, I have a suggestion for you guys," Jenny proposed, taking a seat across from Gabriella. "Are you working on anything pressing?"

Gabriella shook her head. "Nope, nothing."

"Why don't you leave now? Take off, have a long lunch, spend some time together?"

"Oh I... no that's okay," Gabriella insisted. "'Thank you. I'd feel awful doing that. It's not like I'm working hard as it is."

Jenny rolled her eyes. "You're stuck here over the holidays. You're entitled to be lazy. Besides, why just sit here and do nothing when you could go away and do nothing?"

"She makes an excellent point," Troy said with a smile.

"I'll be here all afternoon, I arrived at 12:30pm today so I'd be here until 4:30pm anyway. I'll stay back the half hour, if they question my timesheet, I'll say you weren't feeling well so I told you to go early."

Gabriella bit her lower lip. She was feeling tempted, all of her years of being straight laced making the concept of playing hookey extremely appealing – perhaps making up for never ditching a class in high school.

"You'll call me if anything comes through?" Gabriella asked hesitantly.

"I will, I promise," Jenny said. "I may only be a temp but I've been temping here for longer than you've worked here, on and off. I can handle almost anything that comes through."

Gabriella felt torn, but one glance at Troy and she was suddenly sold. "Okay, I'm in. Shit no... no I can't."

"Yes you can," Troy prodded, and decided to take matters into his own hands, packing up her things.

"But what if..."

"Seriously. I'll call you if any client calls with any new orders. You're just waiting on results to come back for the _Rawlings Co_ project, and they're not due back until tomorrow, right?"

"Right."

"Um, but I need to handover..."

Troy snorted. "Baby... I think I can handle it," he said, and gave her a wink.

The wink caused the slightest of shivers down her spine, and that was it, she was decided, and closed down her computer and picked up her purse. "Um... I just need my lunchbox..."

"I'll go get it," Troy volunteered, and disappeared into the kitchen.

"Jenny, you're amazing," Gabriella said, squeezing her colleague's arm.

Jenny waved her hand. "Honey, you've got this delicious eye candy doting on you here, I more than understand. Go. Enjoy."

Troy returned a moment later, carrying Gabriella's purple cooler bag and wrapped his arm around Gabriella's waist. "I'm dragging you away before you change your mind."

"Have fun," Jenny called after them with a teasing tone.

"We will," Troy called back, causing Gabriella to thwack him in the stomach. "Ouch!"

"Troy!"

Once out in the corridor between the office and the elevator, Troy leaned over, murmuring by her ear. "So, how far is your place from here? I've never done the drive straight from Palo Alto to Foster City."

"Who says we're going to my place?" she asked, quirked eyebrows.

"Oh, will it be the elevator then?" he joked.

They separated only for the drive back to Gabriella's place, the whole way, Troy driving closely behind her. Despite her aloofness, the moment that they entered her apartment, she dropped her bags to the floor, not even making it to the little table in her entryway.

"It came close to being the elevator in my building," she groaned, yanking down his zipper.

"My little minx."

…

Saying goodbye was hard. Gabriella came precariously close to going with him to work, not wanting to say goodbye, but he convinced her to stay.

"Hey um... I'm gonna stay home tomorrow. I have to catch up on some lesson planning for when we go back next week," he told her. "I want to get it over with, so we can relax this weekend."

"This weekend? You are aware that Saturday is New Years Eve, right?" she pointed out with a smile.

"You have party plans?" he enquired with a smirk.

"No," she admitted.

"Now you do."

For a moment, she thought he was referring to a party that he was having or that he was going to take her to. But then, the soft kisses on her collarbone indicated otherwise.

"A private party, is this?" she murmured.

"Mmm-hmm. The best kind of party."

She took in a deep breath, revelling in the sensation of his tongue trailing across her neck, before pulling away.

"You need to go. Hardly fair to get a girl worked up and then dash away," she reprimanded.

He grinned. "Sorry. I can't resist you."

"The feeling is mutual."


	35. THIRTYFOUR

**SERENDIPITY**

THIRTY-FOUR

_~ Friday 30th December, 2011 ~ _

Gabriella felt weary. The week may have been fairly quiet, but on Friday, all sorts of little requests and projects came up – clients getting ahead of the game and placing requests in advance ready to get started in the new year, the public holiday coming up on Monday causing a slight flurry of panic, as any public holiday would. It wasn't unmanageable, but Gabriella was wishing Troy had come in to spend time with her – she could've easily put him to work. As it was, Jenny spent nearly all of her four hours assisting with the phones instead of just being holed away in her filing area. She was looking forward to going home, throwing some things in a bag and heading over to Troy's.

Fortunately, due to the increase in the pace, the day went fairly quickly, and before Gabriella knew it, it was 5pm and she was organising her handover, diverting the phones and calling through to hand over. Being Friday, she didn't deal with Troy, it was Jacqui instead who took handover. Gabriella stumbled out of the building and to her car, going onto autopilot for the entire drive north on the 101. She felt a sense of relief as she pulled into the driveway of her apartment complex, down into the undercover garage and drove around to her parking spot. She almost could've napped briefly in her car, the only thing giving her the energy to spur on being the thought of collapsing on the couch and calling Troy to confirm what the plans were.

She headed into the elevator from the parking garage, beeped the panel so that she could she could access her floor, and then hit the button. The elevator ascended the few floors and Gabriella emerged, turning to head to her apartment, focusing on the keys in her hand and fishing out the key for her front door.

She was so focused on her set of keys that it was only moments before she arrived at her front door that she registered that a chestnut haired man was sitting on the floor leaning against her door, grinning up at her. She halted just feet in front of him, staring down in bewilderment.

"I see my order of smoking hot man has arrived," she managed to quip.

Troy laughed, rising to his feet. Gabriella practically collapsed into his arms, surrounding herself in the warmth of his embrace, leaning against him in the corridor.

"I missed you," she murmured against his shoulder.

"Missed you too, babe," he murmured back.

She pulled away just slightly, enough to allow her to press her lips against his softly, and then returned back to his embrace. He laughed.

"So uh, I've been sitting here for a little while, don't suppose we could go inside?"

She nodded and, without completely retracting herself from him, reached out with her key to open the door, leading him through.

"I'm so glad you're here, today was such shit. It wasn't busy in the context of a normal day, but in the context of just me and Jenny, it was bedlam."

He frowned. "You should've called me! You didn't say anything about it when we texted."

She sighed. "I know, I know, but I felt bad since you've gotten behind in your 'real work' since me. I wanted to just leave you be."

"Sit," he ordered her, gesturing to the couch. "I'll bring you a drink. Do you have any wine?"

"Just a water for now," she requested.

He obliged her request, heading into the kitchen to retrieve a glass of water for both of them.

"How long were you sitting out there, anyway?" she asked, calling behind her. "And how did you get into the building?"

"Probably 45 minutes? I timed it so that if you left right on 5 and got a good run of traffic, I'd be here when you got at home."

"But I left 20 minutes late and got an average run of traffic," she said with a pout. "Sorry."

He emerged from the kitchen with two glasses of chilled water, and set them both down on the coffee table in front of her before collapsing onto the sofa beside her. "Ahh, my ass prefers the cushioning here than the carpet outside, that's for sure."

"That doesn't answer how you got into the building," Gabriella said, somewhat suspiciously.

"I kind of just slipped in with someone else," he laughed. "I knew from being here before that your swipe entry key wasn't floor specific. I hung around just outside the street entry until this older lady came in and then came in behind them, and was my charming self and asked them what floor she was headed to and pushed her button and then yours, and played stupid when she pointed out that I hadn't swiped and they leaned over to swipe for me," he laughed.

Gabriella rolled her eyes. "Sneaky."

"Indeed."

She snuggled into his side. "Do we have plans tonight?"

"That's up to you. I haven't made any reservations but it shouldn't be too late to ring around and see if we can get one. Or we can just go somewhere casual where we won't need a reservation. Or order in."

"Mmm I don't mind. Did you want to do anything for tomorrow night?"

Troy hesitated. "Well... Chad kind of asked me if we wanted to go over to Taylor's? She just wanted a quiet-ish night in, a few drinks, she's going to make dinner. We can crash in her guest room if we both had a few drinks. It's hardly a guest room, more like a closet, but the bed is comfortable. I speak from experience."

Gabriella pondered for a moment, before answering thoughtfully, "Mmm... that would be nice."

"Only if you're sure. Think about it, we don't have to," he said, kissing her lightly on the forehead.

"I think I'd like to stay in tonight. Is that boring?"

Troy laughed. "Not in the slightest. I entirely agree with staying in."

She smiled as his lips pressed to hers, at first for a light peck, then a touch harder with a gentle kiss, then a lingering soft kiss.

"Do you know what the best thing is about this weekend?" Troy asked.

"What?"

"We have about 68 hours until I need to think about heading back to my place to get ready for work."


	36. THIRTYFIVE

**SERENDIPITY**

THIRTY-FIVE

_~ Saturday 31st December, 2011 ~ _

Taylor's apartment was filled with the sounds of Top 40 music playing from the radio, one of the radio stations counting down the midnight with a countdown of most requested songs of the year. There was only four of them at their party, but there was only four needed. They'd eaten dinner, talked, laughed, exchanged stories and now, they were seated in the living area with just an hour left until the clock would strike midnight and 2011 would be in the past. Troy and Gabriella were curled up down one end of the sofa. The guys were drinking beer and Taylor had been making frozen margaritas for herself and Gabriella. None of them were drunk but it was a fun, happy buzz. Gabriella had accidentally spilled a little margarita on her top and Troy had made a public show of cleaning it up.

"Eww, there are people here," Chad joked.

"I cannot get over how cute you guys are together!" Taylor gushed.

"I know," Troy declared proudly, squeezing Gabriella's hand.

"You'll have to excuse Taylor, she's clearly gone insane," Chad remarked. "Finding your PDA to be 'cute.'"

"If it's the P part of the PDA that makes you uncomfortable, we can go in the guest room now, if you want?" Troy offered.

Gabriella thwacked him on the chest. "Very presumptive of you!"

Troy mocked being hurt, rubbing his chest where she'd hit him. "Ouch, babe!"

"Oh, I like you, keeping Bolton in line," Chad said approvingly.

The group had formed an immediate camaraderie. Gabriella and Taylor gelled so instantaneously, it was as though they were destined to be close friends. Chad was a fan of anyone who made Troy happy and there was no questioning the delirious happiness that was emanating from Troy, the beaming expression every moment he was in Gabriella's presence, the hungry look he would give her when she went into another room and then returned to his side.

When the clock struck midnight and they watched the delayed telecast of the ball dropping in Times Square, both couples in the room went quiet, kissing each other softly to ring in the new year.

"Happy New Year," Troy murmured.

"Happy New Year," Gabriella said softly in return.

"Are you excited for 2012?" he queried, cupping her chin.

"A month ago if you'd asked me that question, I would've said not particularly. But now... I'm ecstatic."

"A year for happiness?"

"Mm-hmm. I hope so."

The moment was interrupted by Chad yanking them apart. "Enough sweet nothings, Happy New Year, guys!"

Handshakes, hugs and kisses on the cheek were exchanged between them all, before fresh drinks were brought out and in a tipsy stupor, the conversation turned serious.

"Do you guys have resolutions this year?" Taylor asked, looking around at everyone.

"I make resolutions every year, they never happen though," Chad remarked, rolling his syes.

"Then maybe you should have one of your resolutions be to see through your resolutions," Troy joked.

"I do," Gabriella offered. All eyes looked at her, Troy squeezed her thigh. "I want to start studying part time, do my graduate studies. I really don't want to keep in this particular role at _Inspire_, and anything I want to move into will be more likely to happen if I get further qualification."

"That's a great resolution," Troy said, nodding enthusiastically.

"Troy's resolution should be to work less," Chad laughed.

Troy rolled his eyes. "Shut up."

"I want to see my family more," Taylor declared. "I haven't seen my parents in like, nine months."

"I think my parents are gonna come here soon," Troy said with a slight groan.

"Really?" Gabriella asked, eyebrows raised.

"Mom mentioned it sort of off the cuff last time we spoke."

"How are Jack and Lucy? Have you told them you're a taken man now?" Chad asked.

"Um, not yet..." Troy said carefully, glancing at Gabriella beside him.

"Don't worry, I haven't told my mom yet," Gabriella said, squeezing his leg. "But she knows me pretty well... she's going to suspect something is up so... I'll probably tell her. I want to tell her. She's my mom, you know?"

"Troy's never been good at lying to his parents, I bet he'll spill," Chad chuckled.

They stayed up talking and laughing until 1am, phones buzzing with 'Happy New Year' text messages coming through from family and friends. It was Taylor who began to yawn first, and then Gabriella conceded that perhaps they should think about hitting the sack. She and Troy had already stowed overnight bags in the guest room. While Gabriella helped Taylor to clear away their empty gasses and plates of nibbles, Troy headed into the bathroom to get ready for bed. Gabriella was gathering her own overnight bag just a couple of minutes later, and stepped into the bathroom just as Troy was finishing up. He pressed a light kiss to her lips.

"Mm, you're minty fresh," she commented with a smile.

"Just the way you like it," he teased, and gave her another quick kiss for good measure. "I'll be waiting for you."


	37. THIRTYSIX

**SERENDIPITY**

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

_~ Sunday January 1, 2012 ~ _

Troy's words rang in Gabriella's mind as she got ready for bed in the bathroom – that he'd be waiting for her. As she washed her face, brushed her teeth and changed into her nightie she contemplated whether she would feel comfortable making love at Taylor's place, whether Troy would expect that they were going to. She wrapped her dressing gown around her before emerging, and blushed hard when she interrupted Chad and Taylor in the midst of a passionate embrace in the kitchen.

"Err... sorry," she stammered, blushing.

Neither of them minded, just smiling at her. "If you want anything overnight, drink, something to eat, please help yourself," Taylor requested.

"Thank you, I appreciate it. Good night guys, and happy new year again."

By the time that Gabriella came into the bedroom, Troy had pulled the covers back and was lying back with the pillows fluffed up behind him, having brought with him a pair of flannel pyjama pants with blue stripes.

"You own pyjamas?" Gabriella laughed, closing the door behind her.

He smirked. "I bring them out on special occasions."

"They're sexy," she teased with a smirk. She quickly stripped her bathrobe off and laid it over a small chair in the corner of the room, before switching off the main light, leaving just the lamp on the bedside table on. She brought her cell phone, setting it down on the table between Troy's cell and the lamp, and then climbed in beside him. He immediately moved in closer, snuggling in behind her.

"It's kind of strange feeling those pyjama pants against me in bed," she giggled, rubbing her bare leg against him.

"I feel really strange wearing them," he laughed. "I don't think I could sleep wearing them. Okay, they're coming off."

Gabriella giggled as he wiggled around under the covers, finally pulling down the pyjama pants and hurling them across the room.

"Much better," he declared, and snuggled into her once again.

"Do you want the light off?" Gabriella asked, gesturing toward the lamp.

"Hrm, if you like," was his simple response, and Gabriella moved out of his hold to reach toward the lamp, flick off the switch and then moved back to settle beside him.

It was a double bed, smaller than the queen sized bed which both Troy and Gabriella had at their apartments, and so even if she'd wanted to keep herself segregated from his touch, she was inevitably going to be in fairly close proximity to his body. She remained still, snuggling herself against his form – and then felt Troy's hands sweep aside her hair, and then he proceeded to pepper light kisses on her neck and shoulder. She couldn't help but sigh in pleasure – it was a delicious sensation, simultaneously affectionate and arousing. She was content to allow it to continue, but when his hand fell on her stomach and slid up toward her breast, she had to interject.

"Troy? I um... we're at someone else's place..." Gabriella murmured.

She felt his hand on her breast still, squeeze gently but then move back down to her stomach.

"Does that matter?" he murmured by her ear.

"I just... it's weird. I've never... I've never done it like that."

"Really? Never while anyone else is in the house?"

"Never."

"Not even in college?"

"Not even then."

"Incredible."

They remained quiet, Troy's hand remaining on her taut stomach and gently stroking. The sensation was soothing, but it was also stimulating.

"You know what my New Years' resolution is?" Troy spoke suddenly.

"What?"

"To not fuck this up."

Gabriella shuffled around, turning to face him. The room had just enough light coming in through the sheer curtains to allow her to see the outline of his face.

"This?"

"You and me. Us. I know it's new and who knows what lies ahead but... if I did something to fuck this up, then I'd be the stupidest guy on the planet. So... that's my resolution."

Gabriella reached up, caressing the side of his face with her hand. "Oh... Troy..."

"I mean... if it just turns out we're not meant to be then that's one thing but... we're talking me doing something stupid. That sort of thing."

"Are you known to do stupid things in relationships? Because so far, you've pretty much remained in the 'flawless' category to the point that it is a little frightening."

"Hrm, just wait til we get more familiar and I'm like, leaving your toilet seat up and stuff."

She giggled. "If that's the worst, then I think I can handle it." She leaned forward, pressing her lips to his gently. "And I'm pretty resolved to not fuck this up either – in case you didn't know, I'm kinda crazy about you and I'm hoping to keep you around."

He didn't respond verbally – instead responding physically, returning her kiss and deepening it further. She allowed him to kiss her hard, with passion, with fervour.

"Troy?" she murmured into the darkness.

"Mmm?" he responded, his lips fixated on her neck.

"There's a first time for everything."


	38. THIRTYSEVEN

**SERENDIPITY**

THIRTY-SEVEN

_~ Monday January 2nd, 2012~ _

There was a somewhat solemn mood come lunch time on Monday. The morning had been lazy, waking up, touching, caressing, making love, falling back asleep briefly, before finally waking up to bathe together. Both were acutely aware that the magic fairytale of the last two weeks was about to end. Troy was back at _Inspire_ that evening and then back at school the next day. Gabriella would have no more lazy days at work – if anything, it was set to be busier than ever. There were no long weekends in the immediate forecast. They didn't live hours apart, but when Troy had about eight hours spare each night between each of his jobs and he needed some form of sleep, they were going to be relegated to the brief snapshot of time they'd have on the weekend together. And they'd developed a connection which dictated that seeing each other just on weekends was going to be hard.

Troy hunted through the ingredients in Gabriella's cupboards and decided to whip them up a quick lunch – making a simple pasta dish. They were sat across from one another at Gabriella's small four seater dining table, the sullen mood causing conversation to more or less halt. Finally, it was Gabriella who decided that it was time to bite the bullet and initiate the conversation that they needed to have.

"How is this going to work?" she asked softly.

He looked up at her from his plate of pasta. "Here I was thinking that we were ignoring the pink elephant in the room."

"We were but... the pink elephant has to leave soon, so..." She set down her fork – she wasn't very hungry, although Troy's cooking skills were comendable.

He smiled, joking, "You're calling me an elephant?"

"If I wasn't feeling suddenly petrified I could make a joke about a trunk," she said, somewhat sourly.

He managed a smile. He took one more mouthful of his lunch, chewed, swallowed, set his fork down and then pushed the plate away. He looked straight at her, responding to the initial question. "It won't be easy. I know that. I don't want to pretend that it will be but, it isn't going to be impossible."

"Not impossible... we'll have weekends, after all."

He nodded enthusiastically, and pointed out. "Every Friday, I can be here by the time you get home from work."

"And then we can go together to your place on Sunday, and I can be with you until the minute you have to leave for _Inspire_," Gabriella offered.

Troy rose from his seat, and moved across to the seat directly beside Gabriella and moved it over a little closer, so he could take her hands in his, clasping one in each of his.

"We'll still talk. It's not like I juggle a job on Mars and a job on Venus."

She sighed. She knew that she was being somewhat melodramatic but she couldn't help but feel a little petulant. "I know it's just... what if it's Wednesday and I want to see you? I can't just drive over and we grab a quick dinner, you know?"

"You could. It'll just be... while I'm at work, on my break," he pointed out, squeezing her hands. "Which, you know, I'll welcome, any time that you feel the need. And you can like, prearrange some sort of 'meeting' with Taylor and claim the gas miles through work."

Gabriella nodded, trying to wrap her head around the concept. But she had to confess one thing.

"I'm gonna wind up nagging you to quit _Inspire_, you know? I... I already feel it. I already feel that need to nag and we're just... you know, we've only been seeing each other a few weeks."

"You won't be the only person who nags me about it, so it's okay," he teased, but then turned to the serious point. "You do know why I do it? Like... I'm not actually a workaholic. I'd love to have more time to veg out, go to the gym – hell, even read a book that isn't something I want my kids at school to read.""

Gabriella sighed. "I... I get the theory. You want to pay off your student loans and your car loan."

"Not just that. It isn't just about paying off a loan. I'm doing this for my future... for the future of any future wife and kids I may have. I don't wanna start life ridiculously in debt. I wanna get rid of it all now so that I can have a real life down the track. Don't you get that? Surely you can understand that."

"But are you doing it at the expense of the life that you could be having now?"

Troy paused. "Ever since I started doing this, I've not had a reason to stop doing it. Chad and Taylor are at _Inspire_ so it's not like I never see my friends. I've dated casually over the last year but never found myself finding someone who made me think I'd change things for them."

Gabriella cocked her head. "And now?"

He sighed. "I'm not running out and quitting _Inspire_ tomorrow but... Gabriella, this, what's between us – it's not just a bit of fun. I think we both know that... that we feel more than that. Yeah?"

"Yes," she agreed tenderly.

"I don't prioritise work over my family and friends and relationships, not ones that are important to me. So if the way that I live my life now ever actually became like, a deal breaker... I'm not gonna let us break. But I do believe really strongly in what I'm doing and so... I need you on board with trying to make this work around it. If you don't understand my reasons, then that's kind of a big deal for me, you know?"

"I _do_ understand."

"Don't say it unless you really do. Because people say they do but sometimes I don't think they actually, truly do."

"I don't say things unless I mean them. Your reasons... your reasons are sexy. They're a part of what makes me crazy about you. The fact that you think about the future and structure your life and think about the day that you'll have family..." she trailed off, sighing, and leaned over to press a soft kiss to his lips. "I understand."

"I must've done something right," Troy mused with a smile.

"Huh?"

"For kharma or God or fate or whatever to bring you into my life. I must've done something right," he elaborated.

She blushed, and teased, "Nothing to do with any of those things, you're just really hot."

"And a good lay?" he teased back.

She pretended to contemplate. "Hmm..."

"Hey!"

She laughed, and gestured toward his plate of food he'd abandoned. "Eat up, or you won't have enough energy to get through the rest of the day."

"You planning to have me use up lots of energy, huh babe?" he queried with a smirk.

She rolled her eyes. "Unlikely, since you're being so cocky."

…


	39. THIRTYEIGHT

**SERENDIPITY**

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

_~ Tuesday 3 January, 2012 ~ _

The holiday season was technically over – the majority of staff were back on deck at _Inspire Solutions_ Palo Alto branch, bar a few upper managers who had an extra week off on leave. Gabriella was being doted on by her colleagues, who were all ecstatic with the way she'd handled things the week before. They'd walked into an organised set of clients, everything that needed to be actioned had been actioned.

"You look... happy," Kelsi observed suspiciously. "I thought you'd be all worn out from being here all week."

Happy was an understatement. The intermittent text messages throughout the day served to motivate her and she couldn't help but feel a wave of euphoria each time her cell vibrated with a text from him. Gabriella was bursting - people all around her had noticed her mood, but she'd brushed it off and they had just attributed it to that good vibe that went around just after the New Year, people feeling afresh with new life goals and fresh drive for the year. But the reality was that she was basking in the first stages of a relationship, that honeymoon period where everything is lovely and butterflies and rainbows. She was hiding her cell phone away, trying to text as discreetly as she could, trying to pretend that the wide smile on her face was just a good mood or thinking of something funny she'd heard, when in reality, he'd turned her into a melting puddle of goo.

"Gabriella, do you have a minute?"

Gabriella whipped her head up, seeing Catherine standing over her. As discreetly as possible, Gabriella placed her cell phone on the desk.

"Sure Cathy, not a problem," she responded quickly, hoping her voice sounded calmer than she felt.

She had been using her cell phone a lot but she thought that she'd been discreet and she was still getting all of her work done. In the moments it took to follow Catherine back to her office, Gabriella went through a series of possibilities in her mind, including that she was in trouble for using her cell phone too much, that something had gone drastically wrong while she was away and she was about to be fired, and that Catherine had heard about her and Troy. Strangely, the last panicked Gabriella more than the second – she'd reached a point of valuing her relationship above her job, a position she'd never envisioned herself being in.

"Take a seat, Gabriella," Catherine said, gesturing to the chair in front of her desk and closing the door to her office.

Gabriella slid into the chair and waited expectantly.

"I just wanted to have a chat about how things went over the break, if there were any issues, anything I should know about."

Gabriella immediately felt relief. "Oh... no, everything was fine. It was genuinely quiet. Friday was the busiest day, as you would see from all my handover notes, but it was manageable. Jenny, as always, is a superstar."

"I did go through all your notes, everything looked like it had run smoothly but I wanted to find out anyway. I did see that you wound up being requested for some work on Christmas Eve," Catherine commented, eyebrows raised.

"Um, yeah, that was sort of random... I wasn't doing anything and I knew it was helping out the wider company. They shouted us dinner, it was a nice night," Gabriella commented with a laugh.

"You're not planning on leaving us to go slum it in the call centre, are you?" Catherine asked. "I know that Taylor McKessie does it so that she can study during the day..."

Gabriella shook her head. "No! Nothing like that. Honestly I have been looking into some options for starting some post graduate study, that would likely start in the spring, so a long way from now. I'd study part time, and from what I can see I can study almost completely in night classes so... no. You don't have to worry about that."

Catherine smiled. "Good. Keep in touch with me about those thoughts. We have a few different programs, you can apply for study support and we can work your hours if we need to. You're an asset to this company, Gabriella, and I know you're going to go places and I would never hold you back from moving on but to see you move back to a call centre role because you thought you'd need to for some reason... that would just be nonsense."

. . .

Gabriella had already memorised Troy's basic school schedule, she knew the school day hours and the lunch break hours and was gradually developing an inventory in her brain for when he had free periods and when he taught each of his lessons. She excused herself to go on her lunch break just as she knew he would be about to go on his and surely enough, a text came through just as she was heading down to grab a sandwich from the deli across the street, with him asking if it was an okay time to call. She called him straight away.

"_Babe, you're lucky to have me," _he announced over the phone.

"I don't disagree, but why?"

"_A girl in one of my classes stayed back after class to 'ask a question' and the question was whether I had a wife because I don't wear a wedding ring. I decided that given the circumstances – being a teenage girl fishing for information about my personal life – but the truth was best so I told her that I'm not married but I have a girlfriend. She sighed and told me that my girlfriend is lucky."_

Gabriella laughed. "That's so cute!"

"_Not cute. Annoying. I don't remember being obsessed with any of my teachers when I was in middle school."_

"Did you have any hot teachers, though?"

There was a pause, and then he conceded, _"No. I suppose not. Anyway, how's your day been?"_

"It's been okay just... one weird thing."

"_Go on."_

"Catherine called me into her office before and I felt sick, it was like, I thought she'd found out about us and was going to yell at me or fire me or something. Turned out she'd heard about my agreeing to 'assist' on Christmas Eve and she was curious about the circumstances."

"_Curious as in suspicious?" _he asked.

She contemplated this. "No, I don't think so, I think it was innocent curiosity. But... ugh... I don't like secrets. It's not like I've really lied but it feels like lying by omission, you know?"

He sighed. _"I'll support you, whatever you decide, babe."_

"If I tell people here... will you tell people there?"

"_On my end I don't think it'll be a big deal. Taylor just told me last night that if we want to tell people, she wants to ask advice from her manager as to whether they should reassign California, that's all. Which isn't a huge deal."_

"That makes sense. Ugh. What do you think I should do?"

"_I think that you're better off telling your manager than having her hear it from someone else. I don't think they'll care, Gabriella, and I understand your personal issues with telling people but I think we'll be temporary gossip and then no one will give a shit. You don't parade your personal life around in front of people and generally, they're too busy to care much. Unless they're your friends in which case, their care factor is just because they care about you."_

"You're so... logical."

"_So are you, usually,"_ he laughed. _"Babe, I gotta go. I have yard duty for the second half of lunch."_

She sighed. Their brief conversations during the day would never be enough for her.

"Yeah, me too I suppose. I'm just standing out on the street. Guess I should go across to get my lunch."

"_Will you do handover today?"_

"Um... probably not. It's kind of tradition, if someone has been on leave, when they come back they do handover. You know, since you've been doing it for them, kind of thing."

"_Makes sense. Okay... I'll talk to you later tonight then, when I'm on break, yeah?"_

Gabriella took in a breath. "Okay. Talk to you then."

She stared at her phone for a moment, still on the edge of the foot path, before shaking her head to break herself from the reverie. It was only day 1 – if she couldn't handle day 1, then there was no hope of making it work in the long term.


	40. THIRTYNINE

_**SERENDIPITY**_

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

_~ Wednesday 4 January, 2012 ~ _

Gabriella managed to get through day 1, and then day 2 went in a similar pattern – receiving cute text messages which made her smile and at one point laugh out loud. The comments from colleagues about her disposition declined, but she still felt like Kelsi in particular was watching her carefully.

When it came to handover time, it was just she, Kelsi and Martha left in their immediate desk area. She was bursting with the desire to speak to him, but she was trying everything in her power to be suave about it and so she sat there quietly.

"Do you want to call Oakland?" Kelsi asked, looking at Gabriella, but smiling sideways at Martha.

Gabriella saw the smile and immediately suspected that Kelsi was still hell bent on her match-making scheme. She couldn't say no though – that would seem out of character. And so, she simply nodded and agreed.

"Sure, I'll call."

She picked up the handset, dialled the Oakland number which she knew by heart, and waited a few rings before it was picked up.

"_Thank you for calling Inspire Solutions, you're speaking with Chad."_

"Hey Chad, it's Gabriella."

"_Gabs! How you doing? What's it like having a team?"_

She laughed. "It's good. It was pretty quiet around here last week. Nice to have some activity around."

"_Hope you enjoyed yet another long weekend."_

"Of course. The sleep in was good," she said carefully.

Chad laughed. _"Gotcha. Anyway, I'll put you through to Troy, yeah? Um... handing over or..."_

She knew he was checking if her call was business or personal. "Yup, handing over."

"_Cool. Have a good night!"_

"You as well."

She was on hold momentarily, before Troy picked up. His voice was formal, and yet somehow it managed to make her melt. _"Hello this is Troy, how can I help you?"_

At that moment, she decided.

She decided that she couldn't keep it inside.

She decided that she didn't want to have to pretend.

"You can help me in many ways handsome, but none of them while you're stuck there," she teased.

She pretended to focus on her computer screen, but out of the corner of her eye, she saw the shocked faces of Kelsi and Martha. It wasn't the kind of comment that Gabriella would make jokingly to a colleague, she would consider it unprofessional.

"_I hope you don't greet everyone from my team like that when they offer to help you,"_ he quickly returned.

"Only the handsome ones."

_"Do I need to be jealous?"_

"No jealousy required, believe me. I'm a one guy kind of gal, remember?"

Troy's voice lowered even further for the rest of the conversation. _"Chad is making kissy faces at me. It's really disturbing."_

Gabriella laughed. "Maybe I'm the one who should be jealous."

_"Not at all. Chad wants me but he's not my type."_

"I don't blame him for wanting you," she teased.

_"Okay, now Taylor is telling me to hurry up. Can't a guy flirt with his girlfriend on the phone during work hours without being hassled?"_

"Apparently they pay us to work, not to flirt. Who knew?"

He laughed. _"Okay handover handover... yeah I've read it. It's fine. Um... and given the tone of this conversation... are you alone there?"_

Gabriella paused a beat, and then responded. "No."

"_Kelsi and Martha are there?"_

"Yes."

"_Had you told them?"_

"No."

"_You have now."_

"That I have."

"_You gonna talk to Catherine tomorrow?"_

"Um... I'll let you know. Probably?"

"_Okay... let me know. And maybe you let Taylor know too? Just in case they ask her about it..."_

"Will do. Okay. Call me on your break?" she asked hopefully.

_"You know I will. Miss you."_

"Miss you more."

Gabriella begrudgingly hung up the phone – and turned back to the gawking Kelsi and Martha.

"We were only gone like, a week, right?" Kelsi asked, looking around.

Gabriella smiled, ducking her head and blushing. "Yes."

"And in one week you've gone from subtle flirtation to... that?" Martha said, eyes wide.

Gabriella bit her lower lip. "Are you girls doing anything tonight? Do you wanna go grab a drink or something?"

"I will make time if we get to hear the details!" Kelsi said.

Half an hour later the girls were seated at a restaurant, each with a wine in front of them, having ordered a few different appetiser dishes to share some food for dinner.

"Okay... time to spill," Martha said, done with being patient. "We go on leave for a week and come back and now you're all... gushy with him! What the hell!"

"To be fair, it kind of started earlier, I just kept it to myself," Gabriella pointed out sheepishly.

"And the reason for not keeping it to yourself is..." Kelsi asked.

"Because I'm pretty close to screaming it out from a mountain top... so before heading to the mountain top, best I just start here!"

"Okay, I need details!" Martha asked, bouncing. "I didn't even know you guys had talked outside of work and the Christmas party!"

Gabriella smiled, and began to tell the story. "I guess it started the night I went to go spend some time at Oakland that evening," Gabriella explained. "I spent time buddied up with Troy, and we took a break together to grab some dinner. We just... clicked. I don't know how to explain it in any other way. I couldn't put it down to the few drinks at the Christmas party, it was still real..."


	41. FORTY

_**SERENDIPITY**_

CHAPTER FORTY

_~ Thursday 5 January, 2012 ~ _

On Thursday morning, Gabriella walked into the office feeling determined and brave that she would have a mature, honest conversation with her manager. The moment that she actually arrived at her desk, she had lost all of that courage. She'd discussed the matter with the girls the night before – it had been therapeutic to go over the details with them. Both were in agreement that she had no reason to be worried. Kelsi was of the opinion that she didn't even _need_ to tell management, however Gabriella was the type who preferred to be open about anything that might potentially be perceived to have conflict.

"You and Jason are in totally different departments," Gabriella's logic had been in explaining to Kelsi. "But Troy and I actually deal with the same clients and so... I don't know. If we were having some issue with the support team and I was defending his work or something... yeah, it could get messy."

All of her logic was still present, but she hadn't retained that feeling of certainty that she could have the conversation without peeing her pants.

She'd texted Troy, telling him that she wanted to but was scared. He replied back mid morning, with a simple "You can do it xo" - and with that, she rose from her desk, and marched over to Catherine's office. Catherine had an open door policy – literally. If her door was open, she was available to talk, if she was working on something urgent or having a private conversation, the door would be closed. The door was open. Gabriella ducked her head around the corner.

"Hi... do you have a minute, Catherine?"

Catherine looked up from her screen and smiled. "Sure, Gabriella, come on in."

Gabriella entered the office and, with a moments pause, decided to close the door behind her.

"What's on your mind?" Catherine asked as Gabriella sunk into the chair.

Gabriella cleared her throat. "Um... this is kind of awkward, I'm not sure how to... yes. Awkward."

"Just say it – I find it's easier that way," Catherine said simply.

Gabriella nodded, and took a breath. "I've started dating someone who is also an employee of _Inspire Solutions._ It's fairly new, but despite being new I'm fairly serious about him. I'm not aware of any direct company policy which makes it against the rules but I guess I'm kind of traditional in the way that I generally prefer to keep my personal life separate to my work life, except now it has entwined but I want to manage that – I don't want any perceptions that my work is being tampered with or that there is any sort of favouritism being demonstrated or anything of the like."

Catherine paused, and then responded by laughing. Gabriella's eyes widened as her manager continued to laugh.

"I'm sorry Gabriella, I don't mean to laugh at you. The fact that you're worried about this is why you're such a fantastic employee. There are office relationships going on everywhere here. For example, if Kelsi and Jason think they're being subtle, they're really not."

"But they're in completely different departments."

"Who are you dating?"

"Um... you probably don't know him personally. His name is Troy Bolton, he works for the Support Team in Oakland. He looks after California Sunday – Thursday evening."

"Ah. This would be the Troy Bolton you were spending time with at the Christmas party, and then whom you did most of your training with in your night over at Oakland, and then whom you worked with on Christmas Eve?"

"Err... that would be the one."

Catherine laughed. "I saw him at the Christmas party – he's a looker, that's for sure."

Gabriella blushed. "That he is."

"Gabriella, I appreciate your honesty with me, and I assure you that I have no issue. There is no conflict – if I know you well enough, if you ever did have an issue with his performance whilst dealing with our client base, you'd be more likely to place _more_ scrutiny on him given that you have a personal relationship."

"That's... possibly true."

"Does Taylor McKessie know?"

"I suppose my answer to that is that informally she does – she and Troy went to college and they're in the same friendship group outside of work life."

Catherine nodded, understanding. "I would informally recommend to you that you informally pass along to her that she should run it by her managers – I guarantee you they aren't going to have a problem. If they have no problem with Taylor managing her own boyfriend, then they aren't going to care about this."

Gabriella cocked her head. "You know more about what's going on than I realise, don't you?"

"More than just a pretty face I am," Catherine winked. "Just because I don't participate in office gossip, doesn't mean that I am deaf or blind."

"That is an excellent point."

"As long as you're happy and the quality of your work remains the same – you've got no issue from me. That man makes you unhappy, come tell me and I can easily get him fired," Catherine said with a wink.

"Catherine!"

"I would _never_ do that. Well... probably not." Catherine laughed. "But you're happy?"

"Deliriously," Gabriella responded simply.

"Then he gets to keep his job and we all go on with our days like nothing is different. Agreed?"

"Agreed."

"Excellent. Then you, back to your desk, I hear you have stats due and I have reports to catch up on."

Gabriella nodded and rose to her feet, pausing at the doorway and looking back to say, "Thanks, Cathy."

"Not a problem."

When Gabriella returned to her desk, she glanced at her cell phone, with a message awaiting for her. It was from Troy, with a simple query.

**Well?**

She smiled and wrote back: _Make me unhappy and Catherine threatened she'll arrange to have you fired. Keep me happy and we're all good._

**Noted. Keep Gabriella happy. I know a few ways to do that ;)**


	42. FORTYONE

**SERENDIPITY**

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

_~ Friday 6 January, 2012 ~ _

Gabriella would be lying if she'd said the week had been easy. In any other relationship that she'd been in, msome sort of mid-week catch up would generally occur, whether it be a quick dinner after work or grabbing coffee after a lecture. Things with Troy were much more intense than the early stage of their relationship would indicate – she felt like they'd been dating for three months, not a few weeks. Friday afternoon was a time of excitement for her, having something to look forward to, and it wasn't something that made her feel nerves this time – it was just longing anticipation. They'd agreed by text message that she would call him when she got home so they could figure out the precise where and when. Gabriella didn't care where, she just cared about when: wanting it to be as soon as possible.

"It's nice seeing you being eager to hand over," Kelsi laughed as Gabriella was making them get organised just after 4pm.

Gabriella blushed. "Well, you know... places to be and all."

"Where is he taking you tonight?" Kelsi asked.

"We haven't made any exact plans, just that we'll be together," Gabriella answered.

"Ah... they won't go anywhere. Ten bucks say you order in," Martha declared. Kelsi giggled, nodding in agreement with Martha's conclusion.

Gabriella smiled, blushing. "Um... I won't take that bet because there's a good chance that you'll be entirely correct."

The girls all laughed, and continued to work on their handover. Gabriella texted Troy letting him know that she'd be leaving right on time but didn't receive a reply back, which she thought was a little strange, but decided to not worry about it until she was heading home – she was thinking about calling him from the car with her bluetooth headset which she'd rarely used before, but it suddenly had a perfect use. The afternoon dragged but they were ready right on 5pm, desks packed up, the phones diverted and Kelsi on the phone calling Oakland. Kelsi spoke to Jacqui, and the girls were all out the door, waving goodbye to their colleagues who were still wrapping up for the day and heading down to their parking garage.

Where Gabriella found a chestnut haired man leaning against the trunk of her car, smiling goofily as she crossed the car parked, wide eyed.

"What are you doing here?" Gabriella spluttered, eyes wide.

Behind Gabriella, Kelsi and Martha were both grinning, enjoying being witness to the reunion. Troy stepped away from the car, and crossed the car park, both of their gaits increasing.

He didn't respond verbally, instead electing to ignore Gabriella's staring colleagues, and pulled her into his arms. She was more than content to go along, returning his kiss, fingers raking through his hair. It was only Martha's clearing throat which interrupted them and Troy pulled away sheepishly. She remained by his side, not at all wanting to let go.

"Hi Martha, Hi Kelsi, how are you both?" he asked with a smile.

"We _knew_ that you guys would be adorable! We knew at the Christmas party that you were meant to be!" Kelsi gushed, not responding to his question.

"It's all Gabriella, she makes me look good," Troy joked.

"Seriously, what _are_ you doing here?" Gabriella asked.

"Didn't want to wait to see you, I guess," he confessed.

"Troy, you are so adorable too," Martha said with a laugh.

"Chad would call it whipped," Troy said frankly.

"Is that your bicycle?" Kelsi asked suddenly, suddenly realising there was a bicycle upright on its stand in between she and Gabriella's cars.

"Yes, it is."

"You rode here? From Oakland?" Martha asked incredulously.

"I live near Hayward, so no, but no to that as well. I actually drove to Gabriella's, and then rode the two miles to the Hillsdale CalTrain station and then got the train down here and rode to your office."

Gabriella glanced at her watch. "All since finishing school?"

"I was out the door right at 3," Troy admitted. "I had all my things packed up and was rushing out with the kids."

"Why didn't you just drive here?" Gabriella asked.

Troy scratched the back of his head. "Because that is environmentally unfriendly, you know, us driving separately back to your place or wherever we go..."

"You don't care about the environment! You didn't want to be apart from her! You're right, whipped is the word," Martha teased.

"I care about the environment, I recycle," Troy said, jokingly defensively – but not choosing to deny the second part of her statement.

"Um... is your bicycle supposed to fit in my car?" Gabriella asked dubiously.

"It will, easily. Your trunk will fold down," Troy promised her. "Unlock, and I will show you."

"If you scratch my car... there will be consequences," she threatened, as she pulled her keys out from her bag and unlocked the car.

"Bickering, so cute, like a married couple," Kelsi remarked.

"Have a good weekend guys – don't do anything I wouldn't do," Martha called out teasingly as she backed away toward her car.

"Don't scratch her car Troy, sounds like those consequences might put a damper on your weekend," Kelsi teased as she stepped to her car door.

Troy laughed as he leaned into the trunk of her car to fold down the back seat to allow for more room. "Won't happen," he said cockily. "Even if I did scratch, she's all talk with her threats."

They all laughed, and both Kelsi and Martha waved as they stepped into their cars and one by one, reversed from their spots to exit the parking lot. Meanwhile, Troy had his bike secured easily inside and the trunk closed and turned back to Gabriella with a triumphant grin.

"Oh how glad I am because you're right... I really didn't want to have to follow through with my threat," she said with a smile.

"Instead, I should get a reward for my ingenuity and creativity," Troy boasted.

She laughed, and kissed him softly on the lips. "Rewards will be plentiful," she murmured, and then kissed him again.

The sound of high heels clacking against the concrete floor of the car park sounded, and she pulled away from him and glanced up, spotting Cathering traversing across the parking lot. Her vehicle was parked just a few over from Gabriella's. Gabriella felt a little awkward but knew that she was doing nothing wrong – other colleagues had their partners in the office visiting and dropping by for lunch and to pick them up regularly.

"Finished up finally, huh, Catherine?" Gabriella called out with a smile.

Catherine breathed a sigh of relief. "Yes. And I'm only bringing one report home with me, which I'm sure my husband will be mad about anyway."

"Just sneak it in while he's asleep," Gabriella suggested with a laugh.

"That I'll probably wind up doing."

"Um... this is my boyfriend, Troy Bolton," Gabriella introduced, somewhat unnecessarily. "Troy, this is my manager, Catherine Bunter."

Troy extended his hand to Catherine's. "Pleasure to meet you, ma'am."

"Just Catherine, please," she insisted with a roll of the eyes, and accepted his handshake. "I've heard good things about you – professionally that is," she added with a tease.

"Oh?"

"Actually, I just got off the phone with Andrew."

Andrew Gates was the National After Hours Manager – effectively, he was Taylor's manager.

"Oh really?" Troy asked nervously. "I uh... indicated to Taylor that perhaps she should have a conversation with him."

"It seems she did. We were catching up about other matters and just briefly touched on the matter. For your piece of mind, there's no issue."

Troy smiled. "I suspected there wouldn't but..."

"Can't blame Gabriella for being cautious," Catherine finished for him.

"Hey! This isn't boss and boyfriend gang up on Gabriella day," Gabriella joked.

Catherine laughed. "I'll let you two go. Important thing – nothing to worry about. You just keep up the good work Troy, and there won't be any issues."

"Thank you, I appreciate it," Troy said sincerely.

They waved their goodbyes, and Catherine headed to her car, Gabriella to the driver side and Troy to the passenger side of the car, climbing into their respective seats and closing the doors.

"That went well!" Troy said, clearly pleased.

"Except for the bullying me part," Gabriella pouted.

"Hey! There was no bullying on my part!"

"I'm upset anyway," she teased. "You'll have to somehow make it up to me."

He smirked, and leaned over, murmuring to her, "You mean by doing naughty things that make your toes curl and you scream my name?"

She took in a sharp breath. "Hope you don't have dinner reservations, because you're coming to my place and we're not leaving until that comes true."


	43. EPILOGUE

**SERENDIPITY**

EPILOGUE

_~ Monday December 24th, 2012 ~ _

The feeling of having every inch of her body stimulated was never anything but overwhelming. From the moment they'd met and for every day since they'd been dating, first kissed, united physically and finally confessed their love – Troy overwhelmed her. He looked at her and she felt overwhelmed by his love, he touched her skin and she felt overwhelmed with sensation. Some days, it almost felt like too much – almost.

The world outside was irrelevant – work, friends, family; were all so distant. On Friday afternoon, she'd walked out of the _Inspire_ office in Palo Alto on annual leave for a whole delicious week, and she'd been met by the man who she had fallen in love with. They hadn't made plans to go anywhere, instead, it was time to celebrate each other.

He would thrust into her depths and caress her tender button, so fine tuned into how to send her soaring. She tipped over the edge and was brought to a place where she felt almost as though she was going to unravel completely. He always succeeded in bringing her back down – back down into the comforting love of his arms.

They lay together, slightly damp from the exertion of their lovemaking, completely entwined underneath the covers. She wanted to be near to him as her heart beat would regulate and she'd come down from the high and he was more than happy to oblige.

"A year ago today, my life changed," Troy murmured by her ear.

Gabriella thought about this, and then observed quietly, "Last Christmas Eve, we were working."

Troy pulled away from her, just ever so slightly, their heads both resting on the same pillow, noses almost touching.

"Last year, December 24th was the first full day that we spent together, from the moment that I woke up until the moment that I slept, we were together. We only separated for minuscule periods of time. We ate all three meals together. We showered together. Last year, on December 24th, I realised that I wanted to be around you all the time, all day, every day. And over the last 365 days, nothing has changed."

"Troy..." she murmured, tenderly stroking his cheek.

Troy reached over into 'his' drawer in her dresser, and pulled out an envelope, and pulled himself back up. He handed the envelope to her, which she curiously took from his hand, shuffling herself to sit up slightly. She didn't bother with pulling up the covers, they were beyond basic modesty.

"This is my first Christmas present for you," he said softly.

Somewhat tentatively, Gabriella opened the envelope, and pulled out a simple sheet of typed white paper. She began to read. It was a letter, dated two days earlier.

_To whom it may concern,_

_I write this letter to formally tender my resignation from my position at Inspire Solutions..._

Gabriella didn't read any further, before demanding, "What?"

"I handed this in two days ago. I've given them two weeks notice, which, effectively means that after my leave I go back and do one week and then, I'm done. They offered to keep me on the books to do a shift here and there but... I declined."

"I... I don't understand!"

"I told you it wouldn't be forever," he said seriously. "I've been there longer than I ever thought I would be. I should've done this six months ago, really."

"You're done there?"

"I'm done."

"No more crazy hours?"

"No more crazy hours."

The copy of the letter was tossed to the side, and Gabriella practically leapt at him, peppering kisses to his lips and cheeks and face.

"I take it you're happy," he remarked with a laugh.

"I'm grateful not just for me, not just for us – but for you. This was running you so ragged Troy."

He nodded. The last six months had been the hardest. There had been a few weekends where he was so exhausted that they didn't even have sex when they met up.

"That's not it though... there's kind of a part two..."

Gabriella pulled back, cocking her head curiously. "Oh?"

"This... well... it's just a suggestion, and one which I make with no pressure attached whatsoever if you don't like the idea. But um, well... my lease is ending in about a months time. And so, I was wondering, if maybe... we could talk about whether perhaps we might be ready to... to move in together?"

He sounded so uncertain that Gabriella couldn't help but tease him. "Is this a solution to your lease ending, or is this something you want to do?"

"The second! How could you- of course I want to! I've kind of been thinking about it for a while but I didn't want it to be like, some half assed solution to us never seeing each other. It wouldn't have actually changed anything and I suspect it would've made things worse if we'd done it before I quit _Inspire._"

"Troy," she interrupted. "I'm teasing you."

His tense face broke into a smile, and he pushed her arm playfully. "How could you? I ask you something really serious and you tease me?"

She giggled. "I'm so sorry but... you just... it was so adorable how nervous you looked."

"Um, I'm still feeling nervous since you haven't actually answered me..."

"Yes! Yes I want to move in with you!" she immediately blurted out.

"Seriously? Really?"

"Seriously, really," she confirmed. "My lease doesn't end for a few months though..."

"I know. I uh... well. I had a few thoughts. I thought maybe I could move in here for the timebeing, if that is okay? And then... well, we could talk about whether we want to stick around this area, or maybe even look at somewhere in the Fremont area. Now that I'm not gonna need to go to Oakland, it'll only be like half an hour up the bay from Fremont or half an hour from here across the bay to my school."

Her lips curved into a smile. "You really have thought about this, haven't you?"

"Of course I have."

"You do know that when our parents arrive in two days... they're going to put pressure on us?" Gabriella said with a small smile. It was no secret that their parents had all decided that marriage was inevitable. Lucille and Jack Bolton and Maria Montez were all flying into San Francisco on the 26th, and although they'd spoken on the phone prior, it would be the first time for them all to meet.

"Let them," Troy declared. "You know... for us... this is the next step toward that. For all I know, after living with me for a month you'll realise you can't stand me and kick me out."

Gabriella giggled. "I very much so doubt that."

Troy smiled and pressed his lips to hers softly. "I love you."

"I love you too."

_Ooh, you make the season bright__  
><em>_With the lights reflecting in your eyes__  
><em>_All my dreams are comin' true tonight__  
><em>_It's Christmas Eve and I can see we're in love_

~ FIN

* * *

><p><strong>AN: <strong>This was only ever meant to be a bit of holiday fluff, but somehow it went a little longer because I just couldn't let go! There's so much I could write with these two. I won't rule out writing an outtake or two over time if I feel inspired.

I dedicate this story to my counterpart in the after hours support team at my own workplace. We are not involved nor am I interested in him in that way, but he makes me smile regularly with our laughter and camaraderie. One silly joke made by one of his colleagues one day somehow led to the birth of this version of Troy and Gabriella.

Thanks to everyone for the support of this story - I don't have time to respond to reviews, generally, but I read each and every one and they mean the world to me.

Until next time (you know, when I actually update one of my other WIPs...) good day, good afternoon and good night!


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